


Lost in the Dark

by spectrawaves



Category: Teen Wolf (TV), Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Twilight Fusion, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Angst, Background Relationships, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Kinda, Kira is a Good Friend, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Scott McCall & Stiles Stilinski Friendship, Slow Burn, Stilinski Family Feels, and there are a lot of them - Freeform, slow enough, tagged mature for language, this is just life and death but with lydia and stiles, vampire lore, well slow ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-20
Updated: 2019-09-22
Packaged: 2020-05-15 02:53:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 109,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19286644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spectrawaves/pseuds/spectrawaves
Summary: Following the death of his mother just six months before, Stiles Stilinski and his father move to a tiny town in Washington where rain is constant and the people are welcoming, if a bit over bearing. But things change when he meets Lydia Argent, a beautiful but impossible girl who saves his life, and Stiles realizes the world is a whole lot bigger and a whole lot weirder than he thought.





	1. And We're Alone, But I'm Alone with You

**Author's Note:**

> The Jonas Brothers released a new album this year and I wrote a Twilight AU with complete sincerity so it could be 2009 or 2019, who's to say. I blame wholly and completely my best friend, editor, and cheerleader who encouraged me and helped me work out the kinks so really it's her fault you're all here. I take no responsibility. 
> 
> A few things I should say going in: yes I changed the timeline of Claudia's death, I needed there to be a reason for them to move out of Beacon Hills and some angst here and there isn't remiss either way. I also made Lydia an Argent, along with Isaac to give me the amount of vampires I wanted. The Hales are a thing, they're taking the roles of the Quillayutes in this. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy! Let me know if there are any glaring mistakes, but I have edited the crap out of the chapters I've already written and will continue to do so for each chapter before posting it. Title is from Satellite Heart by Anya Marina

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edit: I have committed a grievous error in forgetting about Jackson Whittmore and his inherent resemblance to Royal Hale and worry not I have corrected it. I have also changed what year of school Stiles is in 'cause I missed it when I'd originally edited the first chapter to post ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ oops

Stiles watches the greenery roll past outside the car window as his dad drives north. Beacon Hills is about seven hours behind them and Stiles doesn’t know if he misses it.

He might miss the park by his house, where he used to play as a kid, running over to his mom to show her the cool rocks he’d picked up. He might miss the preserve with its winding trails and sparse vegetation. He might miss the coffee shop where he used to do his homework.

But overall, he doubts he will. His mom died there. She withered away in Beacon Hills Memorial, she’s buried in Beacon Hills Cemetery.

He doesn’t think he’ll miss it.

The jeep rumbles along Interstate 5 in the misty morning. California is behind them and they drive through Oregon in silence. It’s not an uncomfortable silence, or a tense one. It’s companionable. Stiles knows his dad needs time with his thoughts.

Moving to Washington wasn’t an easy decision for Noah Stilinski. He’d gotten married, had a son there, celebrated his twentieth anniversary there. His son learned to drive along the back roads and in the neighbourhoods near the high school. It had been hard to justify leaving, and Stiles knew it. But he also knew that his father struggled just as much as he did.

Their house had been filled to the brim with noise when his mother was still alive, bursting with snippets of songs and laughter and chatter. He and his mother filled the silence so much that when she died, it felt like the house was holding its breath waiting for her to come home and fill it back up. But she didn’t. And the house stayed quiet.

In a way, it had become her crypt.

So Stiles wasn’t surprised when about six months after her death his dad brought forward the option of moving. He’d been offered a job as the sheriff of a tiny town in Washington’s department, and they were willing to pay his travel and moving costs to set him up there.

And Stiles had been ready. He didn’t struggle with the decision, didn’t agonize over the details, didn’t spend days weighing the pros and cons like he might have done just two years previous.

Now he just wanted _out_.

So they packed up. Hauled their lives eleven hours north and tried not to look back.

All of their furniture had already been moved up, most likely placed oddly in the house they were moving into, most likely leaned against walls and pushed into the middle of the rooms to be moved later however they wanted to arrange them but Stiles couldn’t care less. He doubted his dad could either.

Four hours remained of their drive and as soft music played through the shit speakers of Stiles’ jeep, Stiles watched the world rush past them and tried to miss his home. Or tried not to.

He couldn’t tell the difference.

\---

Their house was small. Not that their previous house wasn’t small or that this one needed to be big. There were only two of them after all and well, they only needed a two-person space.

His dad parks the jeep in the driveway next to a police cruiser, issued to him by the department and parked there by some kind soul a few days earlier.

There’s still a few boxes packed into the back of the jeep and they take trips getting them all inside, setting most of them in the living room for now rather than in their assigned rooms. It’s by mutual, silent agreement.

Stiles doesn’t know if he’ll ever talk again.

He’d known it was his job to fill the silence his mom had left, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. It had been too quiet, too much to possibly alleviate. It was a task he hadn’t been willing to complete.

And now that the silence isn’t crushing them anymore, he finds he can’t unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth, even if he wanted to. And he doesn’t know if he does.

His room is plain, as he’d expected.

His bed’s been pushed into the corner across from the door and his bookshelf leans against the same wall as his bed, almost blocking the door. His desk’s been put across from the bookshelf and it sits on the same wall as one of the windows, the other window a thinner, wider one above his bed facing the door. If there’d been any sun to speak of, his room would’ve been filled with it.

He’s glad there isn’t.

His giant bulletin board leans against the desk and the pictures, quotes, posters, and sticky notes that should go on it are tucked in folders in one of the book boxes. He doesn’t go looking for them.

He sets the box in his hands down on his desk, unsure what exactly is in it but uncaring either way. He thinks there’s probably some books in there, possibly school supplies.

He goes back downstairs and halts in the middle of the staircase, seeing his dad at the kitchen table, standing, his fists baring his weight in front of him. His back is turned to Stiles and his shoulders shake. Stiles can see what’s laying open in front of him if he leans over the railing just slightly.

It’s one of the smaller boxes, intended for heavier items like dishware, books, _tchotkes_ and the like. But the one open in front of his dad now is holding the nice dishes, Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner dishes, taken out only when guests would be eating off of them.

But sitting next to them, tucked unassumingly in the corner of the box wrapped in paper but still easily recognizable, is Claudia Stilinski’s favourite mug. It’s sky blue with a green handle, green like summer leaves, and painted with thin, wispy clouds. Stiles knows it well, can so clearly see his mom sitting at the kitchen table in the morning with it between her hands, warming her fingers through the ceramic. He can see her grinning over the lip of it and winking at him when he stumbles into the kitchen, late for school as he usually was.

It feels like the air is punched out of his lungs, like someone claps his back with a chair and he stumbles on the step.

His eyes sting and he’s biting his lip to keep it from trembling almost without knowing he’s doing it.

His dad hears him stumble and straightens, swiping a hand over his face before turning around. His eyes are red and still watery and he doesn’t try to offer an explanation or an excuse. He shouldn’t. His wife died.

Stiles takes the last couple of steps down the stairs and stands in front of his dad, looking him in the eye without having to look up. He doesn’t really know when that happened.

“Me too.” Stiles croaks, voice thick with emotion and disuse. His dad’s eyes well up again and he nods. He pulls Stiles in for a hug and Stiles lets him, not minding that his grip is too tight or that his fingers shake against Stiles’ shoulder. Stiles just ducks his head and shuts his eyes against the sting, pulls his lips between his teeth and bites down.

Stiles wishes he could hate that mug.

\---

Dinner is a quiet affair, both of them exhausted and weary in more ways that one. His dad clears the plates and silverware and places them in the dishwasher while Stiles hand washes the pan he’d used to make stir fry. They move with practiced ease, neither of them able to shake the feeling that Claudia should be sitting on top of the counter with a glass of wine in her hand teasing them as they take care of dishes. _Noah, you missed a spot._

Stiles heads up to his room after that, and with nothing else to do he starts unpacking. He starts with books, the task monotonous enough that he’ll be able to lose himself in it. He places them on the shelves and puts various other things next to them to hold them in place; a signed baseball, a sculpture from a festival in the shape of a pumpkin that his grandma insisted upon giving him, a candle Heather had gotten him for his fourteenth birthday. She’d told him at the time that him he’d needed something to cover his stench. He’d laughed at the time, tugging a piece of her hair a little too hard to be nice. She’d shrieked and smacked his hand away.

Now he swipes a finger over the peeling label, a picture of hanging laundry with the words Fresh Cotton printed over it. He holds the lifted corner down for just a moment before placing the candle on the shelf next to his copy of _And Then There Were None_.

After his book shelf is done he hangs the bulletin board over his desk and tries to motivate himself to hang the pictures and graded papers and enamel pins that he’d set on his desk when he’d found the folders they’d been tucked away in. He doesn’t manage it though, and the board stays blank.

His desk is bare for now, at least until he gets back into the swing of school and it becomes covered in notes and pens and pencils.

Tomorrow is his first day of school. He’s coming into his senior year six months late at the end of February, in the middle of the week no less, and he’ll have to try and catch up in his classes. It’s not something he’s worried about; in fact he’s looking forward to having all his time eaten up by school. Less time to think about anything else.

He tries to play video games on his computer for approximately half an hour, failing miserably, before just giving up and shutting his computer.

He turns around in his desk chair and surveys his new room, smaller than his last with light grey walls instead of blue. He leans his head back and listens to the game his dad is watching downstairs on the TV, no doubt surrounded by boxes with a beer in his hand, drowning just like Stiles is.

He crawls into bed jeans and all before he can think too hard about it.

\---

Northern Ridge High School is unimpressive. The tiny building leans against the woods behind it, its brick walls washed out by all that green. Stiles pulls his backpack over his shoulders and yanks his hood back over his hair in a futile attempt to keep himself at least somewhat dry. The rain isn’t so much falling as it is permeating the air. His clothes are soaked by the time he gets into the building.

He heads straight to the office and gets his schedule and a map from the lady at the front desk after a warm welcome. He tries to smile in return but it only sticks for a few seconds at most.

Another student comes into the office and takes the secretary’s attention, so Stiles leaves the tiny room with fake wood molding and beaten down carpet and follows the map to his first class.

His first class of the day is AP Physics, which is then followed by AP Literature and Composition, Gym, lunch, and then Pre-calculus at the end of the day. The next day he has homeroom, World History, Engineering, lunch and then free period. The schedules alternate every other day.

He walks into his AP Physics class late and his teacher--an older Hispanic woman whose name he doesn’t know yet--looks over at him from where she’s writing on the board and he makes no move to sheepishly make an excuse for himself. He waits her out.

“You must be Mr. Stilinski.” She says, her voice deeper and warmer than he had expected.

“Yup.” Stiles says, nodding and moving a hand to shift his backpack strap on one side, the other hand shoved deep into his jacket pocket. He tries not to look hunched, but he knows he doesn’t do a good job.

“Well have a seat for now and when we start the lab I’ll get you caught up.” She says and turns back to the board, effectively dismissing him. He nods and heads to the only available seat in the room, next to an Asian girl wearing a Letterman jacket. She smiles at him and he offers her the same tiny, seconds-long smile he’d given the secretary.

The teacher--whose name is Mrs. Rodriguez, he finds out after checking his schedule--continues the introduction to the lab and Stiles tries to follow along, having already been taking AP Physics when he left Beacon Hills High. He suddenly misses Heather, his only friend who’d stuck around even after his mom died. They’d had almost every science class together since seventh grade and he misses sitting next to her and passing doodles back and forth.

It’s the first time he’s actually missed anything from Beacon Hills at all, and the realization hits him unkindly. He wants to reach into his pocket and text her about his class, wants to tell her he misses her. But he doesn’t think it’s fair to tell her he misses her when he’s the one who left without even thinking about it.

It all leaves a sour taste in his mouth.

He barely notices when Mrs. Rodriguez walks over to his desk and hands him the lab worksheet.

“You were taking Physics at your last school right?” She asks and Stiles nods, “I don’t know where you guys were in your curriculum when you left, so keep up as best you can and let me know if you need any help. Textbooks are at the front of the room and you’re free to check one out and take it home to catch up.” She says and when he nods again with a small _thanks_ she nods once and heads back to her desk.

“I’m Kira.” The girl next to him says.

“Stiles.” He says and shakes her hand when she offers it.

“So let’s see what we’ve got here.” She says and pulls her lab sheet in front of her, reading over it and setting up the experiment as she reads over the procedure. Stiles watches as she methodically sets everything up with assured ease.

“Here, you time.” She says and he nods, taking the cheap, purple stopwatch from her and watches as she methodically performs each trial and writes down her results in a table at the bottom of the sheet. When they’ve completed all the trials she pushes her paper towards him and he copies her answers onto his own table.

“So where are you from?” She asks and he tries not to sigh. He doesn’t really want to do this whole introduction thing over and over again today, but he knows he doesn’t have a choice.

“Beacon Hills.” He says.

“I don’t know where that is.” She says and it sounds sweet and genuinely curious rather than mean.

“It’s in California.” He says and he makes an effort to sound less like he hates talking. He thinks he’s actually doing an okay job.

“Oh cool! I bet it’s still warm there right now, huh?” She says, her genuine grin somewhat infectious. He doesn’t smile, but he feels like he could.

“Sorta,” He says, shrugging, “It’s still Northern California, so it’s like mid-sixties right now.”

She giggles, “Better than here, I’m sure.” That startles a smile out of him, unbidden and genuine for the first time in what feels like weeks. Hell, it might have actually been weeks.

“Yeah. I’m not really a fan of the rain.” He says.

“Messes up your hair, huh?” She says and the corners of her mouth twitch a little.

“Oh yeah, because I’m obviously making a real effort to have good hair.” He says. She giggles again and he smiles. _Again_. He’s not even close to a laugh yet, but the smiling is nice.

He can almost see his mom pumping a victorious fist from wherever she is. The thought aches in his chest but it’s not all pain. Some of it’s love.

Kira pulls her jacket off and pulls some homework from another class out of her bag and starts to work on it. She tucks her hair to the side, revealing a tattoo right below her ear; three little asterisks in a line down her neck.

“That’s really cool.” He says and points to her tattoo when she raises questioning eyes at him. She smiles.

“Thanks. I had to beg my parents but when I told them what I wanted my dad totally caved.” She says, “‘Kira’ means ‘sparkling’ in Japanese--hence the teeny stars.”

“That’s cool.” He says and he means it.

“Thanks.” She says again, offering another smile and turning back to her homework. Stiles looks down at her lab sheet and sees that she must’ve done the follow up questions while he was copying down the table and she was asking him questions. He’s impressed she was able to do it so fast.

He gets started on his and the bell rings just as he’s finishing up. He packs up his stuff along with everyone else and heads up to the front to drop his lab in the basket on Mrs. Rodriguez’s desk.

“Hey Stiles!” Kira calls and he turns around in the hallway, “Do you know how to get to your next class?” Stiles considers for a second. He could find his way to his class on his own and he kind of wants to. Wants to be alone and quiet for a little while.

But he finds himself shaking his head and giving his schedule to Kira as she looks it over. She leads the way, talking about nothing in particular and seemingly happy to fill the silence all by herself, something he’s infinitely grateful for.

“I’ll see you at lunch!” She says as she drops him off at his class. He nods his assent before he knows what he’s doing. But it’s too late now, so he commits.

“Yeah, see you.” He says and ducks into his class.

His next classes pass almost without incident--gym gets dramatic when he almost smacks the girl next to him during volleyball, which he apologizes for profusely--and then he finds himself sitting next to Kira at a packed lunch table, pulling his lunch out of his bag.

She introduces them all and Stiles forgets about eighty-percent of their names. He does remember Scott, who looks like a puppy personified; and Danny, who looks like an underwear model.

No one makes him talk, and he’s happy to let the conversation flow around him and listen to the voices without really hearing what they’re saying. He feels suddenly less alone than he’s felt in weeks. Maybe even months.

He surveys the cafeteria without really meaning to, taking in the size and number of people and tables within the surprisingly small room. Old habits, he supposes.

He catches sight of two tables on opposite ends of the cafeteria from each other and both radiating a vibe of _don’t sit with us_ ; though for different reasons.

One table is pretty full, loud and… colourful, in a way. The people sitting at it are all laughing and smiling to one another, talking loudly and teasing relentlessly. He notices a girl sitting at that table--and it would be difficult _not_ to notice her--wearing the lowest cut blue sweater he thinks he’s ever seen. Her blond hair hangs in curls and her smiles, while warm, have a sharp quality to them that he can’t quite put his finger on.

“That’s Erica.” Kira says next to him.

“Huh?” He says dumbly. She rolls her eyes.

“That’s Erica,” She repeats, “The girl you’re staring at. She’s part of the Hale crew.” She gestures to the table with her lemonade bottle.

“Ah.” He says. He turns back to her--Erica--and she throws her hair over one shoulder looking over at one of the other people at her table, laughing at something they say and her hair hangs in a curtain as she leans forward to smack them. Stiles can’t look away.

“And the girl next to her is Cora.” Kira says, snapping him out of his reverie, “She’s actually a Hale but don’t ever let her hear you say that the Hales that aren’t blood relatives aren’t Hales. She might rip your throat out.” Kira laughs when Stiles throws her a flat look.

“And next to Cora are Jesse and Tyler, they’re her brothers. And after them there’s Malia--another girl you really don’t want to mess with--Boyd, Leah, and Sam. They all live together on this crazy amount of land outside town. Super nice people, we hang out with them when we go to the beach.” Kira explains. Stiles scoffs.

“You can go to the beach?” He asks, false shock evident in his voice. Kira smacks him lightly.

“Yes, we can go to the beach.” She rolls her eyes, “But it’s really cold until like May and even then the water stays freezing all year.”

“Sounds like a lot to suffer through for nothing.” He tells her and she sticks her tongue out at him.

He doesn’t even notice how at ease he is around her.

“My point is they’re super chill. They can seem kind of intimidating--especially Cora and Malia--but they’re not. I’ll introduce you sometime.” She says and Stiles doesn’t bother telling her he’s tired of meeting new people because she doesn’t suggest she do so right now. She can obviously see how drained he is.

He doesn’t really know what to think about that level of consideration for his feelings.

Then he turns his attention to the other table.

There are four teenagers sitting there, and though there’s room for at least eight people at the table, they’re the only ones occupying it.

He doesn’t know how to describe them, but various words scroll through his head, each more ridiculous than the last. _Statuesque. Ephemeral. Selcouth_. Unfamiliar, strange, fleeting, marvelous.

The red haired girl laughs at something the boy with perfectly coiffed hair and a frankly ridiculous jawline says and her laugh sounds like bells. When she opens her eyes again, her green eyes are arresting. He’s never seen eyes so green or so intense before. They look like emeralds. She looks over in his direction for half a second and his eyes are caught helplessly to hers, the green so deep he could drown in it.

Then she looks away, and Stiles shakes back to himself. It takes several seconds of him blinking to get the after image of her silhouette out of his head.

The other girl, this one with curly dark brown hair and brown eyes that look almost gold, says something to them and the other boy laughs. His hair's the kind of messy that looks intentional, with blue eyes that look like pictures of the ocean in the Bahamas; blue and crystalline and equally as intense as the girls’ and the other boys.

“Oh, those are the Argents.” Kira says as though Stiles staring at them is totally normal. Hell, it might be. There’s certainly enough to keep him looking.

“Allison’s the girl with brown hair, Lydia’s got red hair, Isaac’s the guy with curly hair and a scarf and Jackson's...well he's the other boy. They’re pretty exclusive. It’s not that they’re not nice--I have English with Allison and she’s literally the sweetest person who’s ever existed,” Stiles begs to differ, having met Kira, “But they kind of keep to themselves. Danny really wants to jumps Isaac’s bones but I keep trying to tell him it’s a lost cause.” Kira says, kicking Danny’s chair.

“Like you wouldn’t.” Danny shoots back at her, leaning back in his chair with an air of superiority that’s somehow goodnatured. Kira sticks her tongue out at him and kicks his chair again. "And it's not just Isaac. I'd swing for Jackson too if I thought I stood a chance." He shrugs as though talking about bagging either of the two hottest male people Stiles ever  _seen_ is totally normal and achievable.

“Real mature.” Scott says and ducks when Kira throws her lemonade cape at him. It still hits him squarely in the chest and Stiles finds himself grinning for half a second before it disappears again.

He could get used to that.

He looks back to the table to see them all getting up to leave. They move with a grace that’s literally indescribable. Their limbs seem to know exactly how to move and respond to their command in a way Stiles’ have never done. He trips over air. The girl--the one with red hair--looks over at the table Stiles is sitting at and he could swear he stops breathing. Her super-green eyes flit to his for a second, just one, and he’s caught completely.

Her eyes leave his almost as fast as they’d met, but his heart still pounds in his chest, his breath still comes short. He’s liked girls before, hell, he liked Heather there for a minute, but this is… this is different.

And he’s not sure what to do with that.

\---

When he gets home he dives head first into homework, making dinner for his dad, and then lunches for them both for the next day. He listens to music and finds that he feels a little less lonely than he’s used to. It’s kind of nice. Even if the afterimage of red hair and green eyes won’t leave his mind.

His dad gets home around seven and they eat together. Stiles actually offers up information about his day when his dad asks, telling him about Kira, Scott, and Danny mostly but also about the Hales and the Argents.

“Must be Victoria Argent’s kids.” His dad says. Stiles gives him a questioning look and his dad continues, “She’s a neurosurgeon at the hospital. Brilliant doctor from what I hear.”

“Huh. Cool.”

They finish their dinner and do the same clean up routine from the night before, the ache of an absence not gone but easing, just a tiny bit. Stiles starts humming, a random tune to a song he can’t remember as he scrubs the pan and when he looks up from it to flip it, his dad’s staring at him.

He realizes he hasn’t mindlessly made noise like that in north of six months. His dad smiles at him. It’s a small, tired, hopelessly sad thing but it brings a similar smile to Stiles’ face and he can’t complain about that.

He’d kind of missed filling up the silence, for a moment there.


	2. Such a Waste of a Young Heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lydia! It's her! She's here!

Waking up the next day feels different.

He’s heavy, as heavy as he’s been since his mom got sick, but it feels less like he can’t bear that weight. He lays staring at the wall, its grey colour matching the way he feels.

It’s not perfect--it’s not even that much better--but he can take a deep breath and it hurts less.

It’s a Thursday, and he doesn’t have school until nine. He has to admit he could get used to the switching schedule so he can sleep in. Beacon Hills High had started at the same time everyday, 7:30 am, often before the sun had even made an appearance.

Northern Ridge doesn’t start until 8:15 even on its early days. And Stiles can’t really complain about that.

He rolls over to look at the clock on his bedside table and realizes that it’s only 7:07. He has plenty of time to himself, something he would’ve previously despaired over. But today he could unpack, or read one of his many unfinished books or even just lay here and yawn for an hour.

The possibilities are endless. Which is why he chooses to play on his phone for the next hour only to have to scramble out of bed and into clothes with bare minutes to spare once he gets to school.

Homeroom is as boring as he had suspected it was going to be, so he spends it skimming through his Physics textbook and attempting to read _Othello_.

His World History class is packed, so much so that there’s only one seat left in the room.

Next to the girl he’d seen in the lunchroom yesterday.

He sits next to her and tries to be as unassuming as possible, feeling distinctly out of place next to a girl that gorgeous. Up close she’s even more striking, long red hair in curls down her back, looking like fire against her white, long-sleeved sweater. Her eyes, when she turns to look at him, are hypnotic. She holds his gaze and he helplessly looks back, like magnets attracted to iron. He suddenly can’t remember her name.

He doesn’t really even remember his own name.

She looks away again and Stiles snaps his eyes back to the board at the front of the room. He makes himself very familiar with his teachers handwriting--without actually reading what the words say--while he tries not to look back at her. He’s not sure he’ll be able to look away once he starts.

His teacher, Mr. Parker, starts class and Stiles tries his damnedest to focus on him and what he’s saying--something about the Renaissance that he’d normally be super interested in. But he doesn’t hear a word.

The girl, whose name he remembers is Lydia, is staring straight into the side of his head. She’s leaning ever so slightly towards him and he finds himself wanting to lean towards her. He holds himself in place though, tensing his shoulders to stay where he is. He starts taking diligent notes.

But Lydia’s eyes don’t leave the side of his head for at least twenty minutes, long enough to make Stiles want to snap ‘what?!’ at her. But he doesn’t, mostly because while she’s gorgeous in every way, she’s also sort of… dangerous. It’s not apparent immediately--not on the surface like her brother Isaac who seems to wear the aura of could-kill-you-with-minimal-effort like a cloak--but a couple layers down. It’s in the way she carries herself, the assured nature of her posture, the grace of her movements.

She could seriously hurt someone if she wanted to. She must do some kind of martial arts, Stiles thinks.

After twenty minutes she darts her gaze to the person in front of her, the intensity in her eyes firmly in place even when her eyes aren’t on him. But then her expression smooths out, the frustration seeming to bleed out of her, replaced with bald-faced confusion. She looks gobsmacked and entirely too confused for the situation.

Then her eyes are back on his and he tries to tear away, tries to look back down at his paper but it’s hopeless. He’s caught.

The green of her eyes is… a word he doesn’t know. Arresting. Staggering in the sheer _colou_ _r_  in them. Inexplicable and wondrous and dazzling and almost eerie. They don’t look real and he might say she’s wearing contacts except for the fact that there’s no way they make contacts like that.

He wants to stare at them as long as he lives, wants to find each individual colour within them--because they’re not just green, they’re gold and blue and brown and yellow and even a tiny bit red. But when the whole picture is pieced together, all he sees is green.

He’s starting to think the word green doesn’t mean what it thinks it means. _This_ is green. He didn’t know what green was until this moment, with this girl, staring into her eyes and trying to find a word to properly describe their effect when there isn’t one.

Words weren’t made to describe the kind of beauty he’s seeing and he can’t tear his eyes away from it no matter how hard he tries.

Then she looks down at his neck, where he can feel the heat of a flush making its way up into his face and then abruptly away and the spell is broken. Stiles takes a breath and feels almost dizzy. Discombobulated and uncoordinated. Dazzled.

She turns fully and lifts a hand to her face, covering her mouth and supporting her chin as she scoots her chair away from his.

_What?_

He shakes himself back to reality and the classroom comes crashing back in. He tries to remember he’s in an unassuming high school with unassuming people and trying to learn about influential renaissance painters and inventors. At some point, he actually manages to catch some of the lecture, even though a good portion of his brain is watching Lydia out of the corner of his eye and seeing if anything changes.

She doesn’t even seem to move enough to breathe.

When there’s only half an hour left of class, Mr. Parker hands out a worksheet, telling them to work with their neighbours to determine the answers. They’re allowed to use their books but if they can do it without it they’ll get extra points.

The class erupts into talking as each group begins.

Stiles turns his body towards Lydia but keeps his eyes on the paper. If he looks up, he doesn’t know if he’ll ever look away. He doesn’t scoot his chair any closer to hers.

“I’m Lydia Argent, by the way.” She says and Stiles sucks in a breath as he braves looking at her face and resists the immediate response on the tip of his tongue: _I know_. Her body is still faced towards the front of the room and she’s sitting as far away from him as the desk allows. “I hadn’t had the chance to introduce myself at the start of class.”

“I’m Stiles.” He says and is almost shocked that his voice sounds even halfway normal. He tears his eyes away from her perfect cheekbones and soft-looking lips, “Nice to meet you.” He says and his brain helpfully supplies _you have no_ idea _how nice_.

“Likewise.” She says and smiles a soft smile that shows perfect dimples on each cheek. His brain, fully out of the game and currently trying to get him to make a fool of himself says _fuuuck dude_ as though he can’t see the dimples himself. Her smile is as stunning as the rest of her, but it seems brittle somehow, strained.

She keeps the conversation on the worksheet, her statements only one or two words long, and writes out the answers in handwriting so beautiful he’s sure she took classes to make it look like that. She keeps herself at least an arms length away from him.

Stiles is admittedly thrown. The fact that at first she’d been drilling holes into the side of his head with her eyes, and then had seemingly figured something out--or didn’t--and immediately left him alone is baffling on its own, but then she’d found him repulsive, and pulled herself as far away from him as she could. Short of introducing herself, she hadn’t seemed to want anything to do with him.

As much as he doesn’t want it to, it stings. And it doesn’t have any right to sting. He doesn’t know this girl. Aside from her being the most spellbinding, astonishingly unreal person he’s ever met, she doesn’t owe him anything. And he doesn’t know what he would want from her if she did. He doesn’t even know what he wants now.

They finish their worksheet and Lydia takes their paper up to the front of the room, going around the other side of their desk--the side he isn’t on--and drops it into the basket on Mr. Parker’s desk. She talks to Mr. Parker for a moment and then the bell rings.

Stiles reluctantly packs up his things, finding himself sort of unwilling to leave the classroom and the girl that seems so wildly adverse to him. He wants to figure it out.

She hadn’t been mean, exactly, but it hadn’t felt nice either way.

He’s not sure what to do with that.

He shrugs on his jacket and then his backpack before turning to leave the class, and almost falling over once he does. Lydia is standing right behind him and he scrambles to grab hold of the desk before everything goes downhill. She giggles at him and her dimples make another dazzling appearance.

Normally a girl laughing at him would have blood rushing up into his face and leave him stuttering and looking for the nearest escape route, but _this_ girl laughing at him feels like a gift. Her laugh sounds like music even though he couldn’t name the instrument or the piece if he tried.

The whiplash has him reeling.

Blood rushes up into his cheeks without his permission--again--and her eyes drop to them and the splotchy redness he knows she’s seeing. Her smile drops off her face and she swallows. She nods at him and drops her eyes before walking around the desk and keeping her distance from him, yet again.

He shakes himself before leaving the classroom as fast as he can reasonably go.

He pulls out his schedule and his map and makes his way to his Engineering classroom, which is a pretty generous term since it seems to be about the size of a closet.

There are only seven other people in his class, Danny being one of them. He beelines for the seat next to Danny and only gives him a nod when he looks up.

Danny shrugs and goes back to his phone, swiping through what looks like his Twitter feed.

Stiles sits next to him and tries to get his breath back, to get his body to return to homeostasis. He makes a list, trying to organize his thoughts into something at least kind of cohesive.

The list of things that he knows about Lydia Argent is as follows: she’s beautiful--though the word ‘beautiful’ is the understatement of the last two centuries--and she’s confusing. She seems to go from somewhat cordial to intense in bare seconds, and then she seems to get repulsed by his very existence in the next moment and he can’t figure out what the commonality is. He’s not even sure he wants to. She’s dangerous in an understated way--thought he couldn’t say what gives him that impression. She’s just _weird_ and even though Stiles doesn’t like the way she looked at him today, he can’t help but want to unravel the mystery.

He never could resist a mystery.

Their teacher starts class, a petite woman with short cropped salt and pepper hair whose name is Ms. Schultz, and Stiles takes out his notebook. He’s been using the same one for a lot of his classes and he really should do something about that but he doesn’t have the energy or means to do anything about it now.

His class, while interesting, doesn’t really hold his attention. It’s just a lecture, one that he’s already heard, and he finds his mind wandering completely. He thinks about almost nothing, but his thoughts continually drift back to green eyes that define the colour green.

Then he has lunch, and he and Danny walk to the lunch room together, Danny talking about lacrosse because apparently even in a town this rain soaked they still play sports in high school.

Kira spots them as they make their way over to the table and she waves far too excitedly for the occasion.

But Stiles doesn’t mind.

Her hair is up today, showing off her tattoo and Stiles wonders if she’s cold. He’s never really had long hair, but he imagines it helps with insulation.

He tells himself he won’t look around the room, tells himself he won’t check a table in the back by the windows. But it’s no use as his eyes track their way along the back wall to rest on a completely empty table. He blinks at it.

He and Danny find their seats, Danny next to Scott and Stiles next to Kira. He notices that Scott and Kira are sitting next to each other again today and decides to do something about it as soon as he notices it’s a pattern.

Two isn’t a pattern yet.

He knows, intellectually, that Lydia’s disappearance has nothing to do with him, that this could be a completely normal occurrence that he just happened to be in the middle of; a coincidence. But he can’t help but feel like it’s his fault.

He glances at the Hale table and sees they look just like they had the day before, laughing and teasing and looking overall like a scene in a movie.

He drags his eyes back to his own table and sees Kira looking at him with curiosity in her eyes.

“You okay?” She asks, seeming like she genuinely wants to know. He doesn’t know exactly how to respond, feeling distinctly like a mess at the moment and doesn’t really want to lie to her but there’s also nothing for it.

“Yeah, I’m alright.” He says and he can tell she isn’t entirely convinced, but she seems able to take a hint anyways and leaves him be. He exhales a breath he hadn’t realized had gotten caught in his throat.

After lunch he has a free period, so he considers just taking off and going home to unpack the rest of his things, even though he doesn’t really want to. But he also doesn’t really want to be here either. Things are weird and confusing here and nothing seems to make any kind of sense.

Why did she leave? Why did her whole family leave? If it isn’t him--and it can’t be him--what made her leave?

He runs his cost-benefit analysis and decides that home is the lesser of two unpleasantries.

“I’m gonna head home.” He says suddenly, making all the heads sitting at their table snap to him, three pairs of eyes looking at him questioningly. “I have a free period after lunch so I’ll just head home now. I still have a lot of unpacking to do.” He offers, wanting to explain why he wants to leave, why he can leave. It’s just what he needs to do.

Danny nods and Kira and Scott seem to follow his lead, not necessarily knowing why but letting Stiles do what he needs to do.

“Okay, hey can I have your phone number? We have that lab write up due in Physics tomorrow and I figured you might need a little bit of help getting some of the answers since you’re coming in at a weird time in the semester.” Kira asks and Stiles hands his phone over for her to program her number in. She named her contact ‘Kira Physics’ as though he won’t know who she is if she texts him. His lips twitch and he feels a little bit of her colour seep into his grey. It’s not a lot, just a tiny sliver of yellow on the edge, but he likes it being there.

When he gets home he heads upstairs to drop his bag off in his bedroom before heading back downstairs to move the furniture in the living room into a better configuration and unpack their _fragile_ boxes, picture frames and knick knacks and various other things that he has to look over rather than focus on.

His thoughts wander a little, and before he can stop them they focus on his mom.

On a gray headstone in Beacon Hills, brand new and carved with the words _Claudia Stilinski, Loving Wife and Mother, and Life-Long Friend 1976 - 2018._

He remembers it being put there, and remembers how smooth the stone had felt under his hand when he’d reached out to touch it, mute and numb, tears drying on his cheeks. He remembers the weight of his father’s hand on his shoulder, offering sympathy and conveying worry at the same time.

He wonders absently if he’ll ever be able to forget the feeling in his fingertips. Even now he feels it, as though his hand is resting on top of a stone eleven hours south of here.

He lets himself lose himself in it, in the gray, muted sadness he can’t get rid of as he arranges things on bookshelves. He hangs the curtains and puts the throw blanket over the back of the couch and place the throw pillows against the arms.

He gets the whole downstairs put together, starting with the living room and then moving into the kitchen and then his dad’s office. He doesn’t arrange everything in there, but he does a lot of it, needing to take up his time with something, anything.

Then he does his laundry, even though he doesn’t necessarily have to, and while that’s going he hangs some of the things that go on his bulletin board. He can’t really bring himself to do all of it but he does hang up some things, like pictures of him and Heather, him and his dad.

He holds the picture he has of his mom and dad in his hand for what feels like hours. He can’t let go of it no matter how hard he tries, so he just carries it around with him while he finishes doing his room.

Then he sits down to do his homework and that’s what he’s doing when his dad gets home. He knocks on Stiles’ open door and Stiles looks up, blinking at his dad. His eyes take a minute to adjust but once they do he can see his dad’s mouth is turned up in one corner. He’ll take it.

“How was your day?” He asks and Stiles nods.

“Fine, nothing to report.” He says a little too quickly and he knows his dad can see right through that. He raises an eyebrow at Stiles and Stiles seriously considers pretending her doesn’t know what his dad is asking for before just blowing out a breath forcefully and gesturing to his bed.

His dad takes a seat and leans forward before making a gesture like ‘well go on then’. Stiles blows out another breath and spins his chair around to slouch in it and look at his dad.

“So there’s this girl.” Stiles starts and feels monumentally stupid saying it out loud because yes, there is a girl, but it’s not as though she’s a prospect or that he’s even looking to date her--and besides that Lydia doesn’t really seem like the kind of girl to have a boyfriend. She’s too… unreal for something as pedestrian as a boyfriend.

“Okay.” He dad says, prompting Stiles to continue. Stiles groans and rubs his hands over his face.

“And she’s not, like, a girl I could date but she’s just…something.” Stiles says and his eyebrows furrow while he looks for a word to properly describe her, even though he knows full well that there aren’t any. And besides that she’s _weird_ , way too standoffish yet polite and… _threatening_ even though she’s probably 110 pounds soaking wet and looks sort of…delicate, he guesses.

His dad snorts, “And why can’t you date her, might I ask?” Stiles glares at his dad.

“She’s kind of unreal. Like actress or supermodel level gorgeous but if there’s a level above that, she’s that. I don’t even know what she _does_ to look that good. Like objectively she’s that gorgeous it’s not even that I think she’s pretty and I’ve got the Halo Effect going on.”

“You wouldn’t be talking about one of the Argent girls would you?” His dad asks and Stiles blinks at him. “Their dad came into the station today with his daughter, Allison I think, and I don’t think there’s another family quite that… much.” His dad says, looking decidedly uncomfortable that he’s calling another man anything even remotely close to ‘attractive’ and Stiles suddenly laughs.

Full bodied, head thrown back _laugh_ and it feels so good he has to pull his arms around himself and hold himself together because once he starts he can’t stop and it feels like months’ worth of laughter is pouring out of him all in one burst. Tears stream down his cheeks and he can’t tell if it’s happiness or sadness. He hears his dad laughing alongside him and for a moment, just one, he hears an echoing phantom of his mom’s loud and boisterous laugh that peels off into giggles.

Then the tears are earnest ones, stinging as they pass his eyelashes and he hugs himself tighter, feeling like he has to try to hold his ribs together, feeling like he might come flying apart at any second.

He misses his _fucking_ mom.

Their laughter dies down and is replaced with the mutual sniffling and Stiles swipes a hand down his face, wiping the tears away even as a few more fall. He presses the heels of his palms against his eyes and tries to get his breathing under control.

The worst part of crying, Stiles thinks, is the fact that he doesn’t feel better afterwards. It doesn’t feel like the emotions are released, it doesn’t feel like some of the weight is removed. He just feels soggy and raw and ripped apart. He removes his hands and stares down at his floor, not sure what to do, not sure how to comfort his dad or himself. He doesn’t fucking know what to _do_ and it’s killing him steadily, everyday.

His dad looks up at him, Stiles can feel his eyes, but he doesn’t meet them. He can’t.

His dad stands and Stiles doesn’t know what he’s going to do, whether he’ll leave and let Stiles be alone, or try to offer comfort, or something entirely different. And he doesn’t know which he wants either.

So he waits.

His dad walks over to him and crouches in front of him.

“We’ll get through it.” He says and Stiles nods.

“No way out but through.” Stiles says, starting as a whisper and becoming a croak by the end. It’s true and he hates it and he knows his dad does too but there’s nothing either of them can do about it either way.

His dad reaches up and puts his hand on Stiles’ shoulder, moving it back and forth and squeezing. The motion is grounding and Stiles feels like he’s slowly knitting himself back together, starting there.

Stiles nods and his dad stands, recognizing that they’re done for now. Stiles needs to be alone, and maybe so does he.

He sits there for a long time, slouched in his chair staring at nothing, thinking about nothing, feeling almost nothing.

The sun had long since gone down and now he feels the dark of the night creeping into his bedroom and welcomes it.

He’s not sure how long he sits there before getting up and brushing his teeth and peeling off the day’s clothes before getting into bed. He turns off the lamp by his bed before remembering the picture of his mom is still sitting on his desk. He gets up and grabs it, holds it in his hand as he gets back in and stares at it even though he can’t see it in the darkness.

He has every aspect of it memorized, so it doesn’t matter.

He falls asleep holding it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...I mean I did warn you about the angst sooo...


	3. Tell Me When You Hear Me Falling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> World History is better than Biology anyways...
> 
> Edit: just going back in and adding Jackson, because I have literally no idea how I *didn't* include him the first round

The next day at school absolutely nothing happens. It’s Friday, so his classes are the same as they were on Wednesday. Everyone around him is excited for the weekend and Stiles finds he couldn’t really care less, honestly. The weekend is just more time he has to try and eat up with stuff and he doesn’t really have anything to do. He’ll probably end up finishing at least three weeks worth of homework just to have something to do.

Kira, Scott, and Danny are talking about going to a movie over the weekend and they extend the offer to Stiles. He appreciates it, but even though it’s something to do, he still feels like a smudge of goddamn gray and he doesn’t want to darken any of their colours. They’re so bright all the time. Not everyone has to be dark and muted like him.

The Argents still aren’t back. He’s not sure when they’ll be back and he tries to tell himself he doesn’t care. But he doesn’t believe himself, if he’s honest.

Once the day is over and he’s armed with all the textbooks he could possibly need and a plan for how to properly fill his time he heads home.

His weekend is just as hard to fill as he thought it would be, and he ends up doing way too much homework, going to the grocery store, cooking way too much and remaining almost unbearably quiet. He can’t help it.

Monday he has World History and he tells himself he isn’t looking for her and is disappointed in more ways than one when he sees her chair empty.

At lunch the other three Argents are there, sitting across from each other and hardly talking. Stiles wants to ask them where their sister is, but there’s no way he could even remotely justify making a fool of himself like that. They’re some of the least approachable people in the world.

And he doesn’t see Lydia for days after that. He’s at least seventy-five-percent sure he won’t ever see her again but that last twenty-five-percent holds out hope without his permission. He truly can’t help it, it seems.

Whatever, he’ll just play this by ear and see how it goes.

Friday rolls around and he goes into his World History class ready to head back to his empty desk and zone out for an entire class period, having already read the chapter they would be covering today.

Except his desk isn’t empty.

He stops in his tracks, making the person behind him bump into him. He murmurs an apology to them and continues walking back to his desk.

Lydia sits there at the table looking like a painting personified and entirely out of place in their mundane high school classroom. A goddess among mortals.

He’d forgotten in the time she was gone how arresting she is, how hard it is to do anything or focus on anything with her there. He suddenly wishes he hadn’t read that chapter, desperately needing something else to focus on besides the astonishingly beautiful girl next to him.

He sits in his chair, feeling once more entirely out of place next to her and trying desperately and simultaneously to stare at her and look away. He can’t decide which is worse.

“Hello, Stiles.” She says mildly. He almost chokes on his own tongue and he’s forced to look over at her. She’s smiling, dimples on full display and it makes him feel a little light headed. There’s something different about her and he can’t figure out what it is without staring at her for an extended period of time and seeing as how that’s not an option he’ll have to get over not knowing.

“Hi.” He says, making sure his voice is in the same octave it’s usually in and being absolutely _shocked_ when it actually is.

“How was your week?” She asks and Stiles just stares at her for a second, caught by the dimples and the green of her eyes and red flush in her cheeks. Her lips look soft and full and entirely too unreal. Her entire face is flawless, actually without flaws, not a pore, stray hair, or dark circle in sight. Stiles doesn’t even think she’s wearing makeup, that she just simply looks like that. Her lips are just that pink, her lashes just that dark, her skin that perfect.

She raises her eyebrows at him and he clears his throat, looking down and getting his things out of his bag before answering. “It was fine. Yours?” He asks before thinking about it, before being able to stop himself because he genuinely is curious and very much wants to know where the hell she was all week. And why she’d gone alone.

“Illuminating.” She replies and smiles some more, making Stiles stare at her like a fool. He doesn’t know how anyone talks to her with any level of intelligence.

It takes a moment for her answer to compute and he tries to wrench his brain away from her looks and into the conversation she’s obviously attempting to have, polite as it may be.

“Cool.” He says, like an idiot. Though, to be entirely fair, what the hell was he supposed to do with an answer like that? There was nothing in there to respond to. One word, and it didn’t offer him anything to work with anyways. Maybe there just wasn’t a good way to respond.

She’s still sitting as far away from him as their desk lets her.

Mr. Parker starts class, saving Stiles from further embarrassment but what he says fills Stiles with equal parts dread and elation.

“We’re ahead of schedule in our curriculum so we’re going to take a break today. It’s a catch-up day so any late or missing homework you have can be turned in today for full credit. This counts for quizzes as well, but if you take a quiz you’ll have to leave the room and leave your phone with me. You’ll only get one of these this semester, so use it wisely.” He says and seats himself at his desk again, “I’ll be available to answer any questions you have about your grades as well.”

Stiles is ahead, no homework or quizzes to speak of since all previous quizzes were waived and he’s ahead on homework. He supposes that he could work on homework for other classes, get even further ahead, but he knows he won’t.

Not with Lydia sitting next to him.

“How are you liking it here so far?” Lydia asks, making no effort to get any homework done, probably sitting in the same boat as Stiles, or simply not caring. Stiles doubts that she doesn’t care though, seeing as how even her handwriting is immaculate. He highly doubts that she would blow anything off.

Stiles prepares himself to answer, psyching himself up to focus and say his whole sentence without missing a beat.

“It’s wet.” He says, rather than the intelligent and well-worded response he had been working on. He smacks himself internally and just barely manages to keep the grimace off his face.

She giggles, her musical laugh making his breath catch in his chest until she looks back at him. “It _is_ Washington.” She says and Stiles feels the blood rush up his neck. Her eyes drop to it and she immediately looks away.

“Yeah. Yeah, it is.” Stiles says and wants to have a real conversation with this girl so badly but can’t seem to get it together.

“So do you dislike the rain?” She asks and Stiles snorts a little.

“Yeah. I’m from California.” He explains, finally gaining his footing. He needs to keep his eyes anywhere but on her. Unfortunately that means he ends up looking at the table and subsequently her legs crossed underneath it.

They’re perfect, just like everything else about her, sculpted and long and covered by a pair of black tights. She’s wearing a yellow-y-tan skirt over them and a white sweater that looks far too thin to be warm. It’s falling off one of her shoulders and Stiles can see the lace of her bra strap as it loops across her shoulder and meets at the back of her neck. The lace disappears under the back of her sweater in a complex pattern of flowers down the middle of her back and Stiles has to tear his eyes away from it.

But he can’t help looking at her. He can’t decide what’s less distracting, her body or her face and since looking at anything but her isn’t going to happen he just resigns himself to acting like an idiot for an hour.

“Well that explains a few things.” She says and Stiles glances back up at her face and figures out what’s different about her today. Her cheeks are flushed, all the way across her nose and even the very top of her chest and neck are pink, from what he can see. Hell, even her shoulder is a soft pinkish-red. He’d assume it was from the cold, but she isn’t acting cold, and she doesn’t have any goosebumps. She seems perfectly comfortable.

Her eyes are brighter, if such a thing is even possible. The green slashed through with more yellow and gold, lightening them from the emerald he’d seen last week to almost a springtime green, a colour he doesn’t have a name for just like the other one. It’s fascinating and just like last time, he can’t tear his eyes away.

How could a girl this gorgeous get even more distracting?

“Yeah.” Stiles says belatedly, realizing he’s supposed to say something and not being at all surprised when it comes out a little breathless. She smiles at him.

“Then why move here?” She asks him and it may have sounded casual coming from anyone else, but Lydia operated on a level of intensity that no one else did. It seemed like the height of importance to her that he answer her question.

He clears his throat, “My, uh, my dad got a job offer here.” He says, silently commending himself for a somewhat intelligent response. He drops his eyes from hers and tries to regain his footing. He feels dizzy, just like that first day. And he finally feels like he can take a breath, so he resolves to keep looking down at the table, at his notebook, sitting open to a new page waiting to have notes scribbled on it and he places his pen on the paper to do something to occupy his attention. He’s never been very good with distractions.

“Your father’s the new sheriff, is he not?” Lydia asks and he thinks she sounds a little bit like she came out of a different time. Who talks like that?

“Yeah.” Stiles says wanting so badly to look up at her. To stare at her face and drink in every detail, every perfect aspect of it.

“Was he the sheriff where you previously lived?” She asks and her brows furrow as she stares intently at him. It’s a demand, in a way, a command that he do her bidding and answer her questions. He doesn’t even mind.

“Yeah, Beacon Hills’ finest.” Stiles answers and he smiles the tiniest of smiles, just an uptick of his lips for bare seconds before it’s gone again. If anyone deserves a genuine smile it’s his dad.

“Then what made him decide to leave?” She presses. It might have been rude, coming from anyone else. Stiles doesn’t necessarily have the impression that she genuinely cares, at least not like he’s seen with Kira, but it’s also not necessarily to satisfy a selfish curiosity, to have the latest juicy tidbit on the new kid. Maybe she is genuinely curious, but it doesn’t feel malicious.

She just wants to know.

“It’s… kind of a long story.” He says instead of actually answering her.

“I’m not in any rush.” She says and offers him a dimpled smile. She leans forward on the table, resting her elbow on it and propping her head up with a fist. She doesn’t lean closer to him even as she makes it clear he has her full attention. He inhales sharply before looking away again, back down at his notebook where he’s been doodling a pattern like a kickball in the margins.

He nods. “My mom died, and we couldn’t really stay there anymore.” He says to his notebook and doesn’t dare look up. Lydia Argent now counts as the first person he’s told who didn’t already know. And he’s not entirely sure why he told her.

“Stiles, I’m truly sorry.” She says and when he does look up there’s a miles-deep sadness in her eyes that looks much older than the seventeen-year-old girl sitting next to him. He’s taken aback by it and the sincerity in her voice.

“I-uh-thanks.” He says and nods again, not knowing what to do with that kind of genuine sympathy.

“I lost my mother when I was young,” She says, and it’s the first thing she’s offered up about herself besides her name, “I know how hard it is. I am sorry, Stiles, though I can’t express how deeply.”

Stiles nods again then computes her entire statement.

“But I thought your mom worked at the hospital?” He asks and then realizes how tactless a question that is, “Wait, no, nope, you don’t have to tell me. It’s none of my business.” Lydia giggles and Stiles feels lightheaded. Sitting next to her is seriously bad for his health.

He’s glad she hasn’t taken exception to his entire existence this time. Yet. He really hopes she doesn’t start.

“Well turnabout is fair play, I suppose.” Her smile dies down into something soft and fond in a way Stiles hasn’t seen yet. “Victoria is my aunt. She took me in when my parents died. It was a very admirable thing for her to do.” Lydia looks down at her hands. Stiles feels like there’s more to the story than that, and as much as he wants to know, it’s not up to him whether or not he finds out.

“It was.” He tells her, because he believes it.

She smiles, looking at him from under her eyelashes. His eyes travel along her face, skating from those dark lashes to her full lips and flushed cheeks and then finally back to her eyes. He doesn’t think he could ever get tired of looking at them.

“That explains the lack of family resemblance.” Stiles says and doesn’t even have time to feel foolish before Lydia’s laughing.

“Yes, I suppose it does.” She says through a bout of giggles and he feels like he stumbled upon an inside joke. Stiles wants to say more, but he knows eventually he’ll run out of luck in the intelligence department if she keeps dimpling at him like that. "And it doesn't hurt that Isaac and Jackson aren't related to me either. Isaac is my uncle's godson and Jackson is adopted." 

"Wow." Stiles says, for lack of anything else to say and feeling off kilter in the best way, "Your aunt and uncle are awesome." He immediately feels the almost insurmountable urge to smack himself.

Lydia giggles, "Yes, well, you don't live with them." She has a tiny glint in her eye; it could almost be a conspiratorial look or one that means there's a joke here he won't get but it's more than that. It's like she has something she's dancing around. He can't even describe why he thinks that, just that he does. 

“And does Washington seem to be the place for you, Stiles?” She asks, re-situating her head on her hand and her red hair falls forward a little more. A couple of strands slip over the pale-and-rosy expanse of her shoulder and Stiles watches them go. He swallows.

“I’m not sure.” He says honestly, looking back down at his notebook, “It’s as good a place as any I guess.”

“I don’t understand.” Lydia says. Stiles looks up and there’s a tiny crease between her brows.

“That’s okay.” He says and her face screws up more, as though his answer frustrated her. He’s taken completely aback, “Sorry, did I do something wrong?” He asks even though he’s almost positive he could draw up an itemized list at this point and he’s only spoken to her twice.

“No, not at all.” She says, seeming to be genuinely confused as to why he would think so.

“It’s just--you looked--sort of… angry?” He offers, needing some sort of explanation and not having one, really.

“I do apologize. It’s not you. Normally, I’m very good at reading people. I understand them.” She looks at him, her eyes flicking up to his forehead and Stiles feels the insane urge to cover it up, “But with you…” She shakes her head, “There’s nothing.”

She looks back in his eyes again and he feels the air leave his lungs in a rush, her greener-than-green eyes staring straight into his. His heart chooses this moment to pound against his rib cage. He’s not entirely sure he can blame it.

“I don’t know a thing about you.” She says and Stiles takes in a breath.

“Neither does anyone else.” Stiles says and he can’t tear his eyes from Lydia’s.

“What an absolutely baffling response.” She says and her lips twitch up into a small smile as her eyes flit back up to his forehead.

“Thanks?” Stiles says and Lydia laughs. He wants to hear her laugh played on loop, a song without notes or instruments, but melodic nonetheless.

“You are most welcome, Stiles Stilinski.” She says and Stiles can’t help the flush that spreads up his neck and into his face. Her eyes snap to his cheeks and she draws in a sharp breath before turning her whole head away from him and up to the front of the room. Again, he feels like he’s done something wrong, but her body is still pivoted towards him, her arm still supporting her head.

“I’m not sure why you’d want to know anything.” Stiles says honestly, not from a place of insecurity--though he has plenty of it to go around talking to Lydia--but because he genuinely doesn’t understand.

Lydia chances a glance back at him, “I suppose I just prefer to have my questions answered.” She shrugs elegantly, something Stiles hadn’t known someone could do elegantly before now. “Mysteries annoy me.” Stiles laughs.

Full on, loud, and straight from the bottom of his lungs. When the peels of laughter peter off, he looks back over at Lydia. Her eyes are intense, piercing as they always have been, but they feel like they’re peeling pieces of him away. Her lips are parted and it looks like she’s barely breathing.

He clears his throat. “Sorry.” He says, blood rushing all the way up his face.

“No, don’t be sorry.” She says immediately, “I haven’t heard you laugh before.” As though that explains her reaction or why she’s still staring at him.

“I…I don’t know what to say to that.” He says, mostly because it’s true and partly because with her lips still parted and full and pink as they are, he can’t focus enough to even formulate a response.

“It’s nice.” She says. Stiles had never thought about whether his laugh was nice or not, but if Lydia Argent--with the nicest laugh the world at large will ever hear--thought it was, then he would take her word for it.

He nods, not knowing what else to do, and looks up to the front of the room, and over to the clock mounted above the board.

The class is nearly over. He wonders what happened to all that time, how an hour and a half could have passed without him even noticing. When he turns back to Lydia, she’s packing up her things. He follows suit and when he looks back up, her eyes are back on him.

“It was lovely talking to you, Stiles.” She says. She dimples at him, her perfect teeth on display. He sucks in a breath and nods.

“You too.” He says, for lack of anything better to say. And it was nice, he supposes, if a little intense and entirely too confusing.

Every detail about her seemed to contradict the ones he’d already known and when he tries piecing them together he can’t create a solid picture.

The bells rings while he’s still staring at her and trying desperately not to, and he shakes himself out of it. She makes her way out of the classroom, actually dancing through the door as she swerves around someone. Stiles blinks after her before coming back and making his own way out of the room.

His next class continues in its usual fashion and when he gets to lunch he lets himself sink into the familiarity of his friends. He doesn’t know when he started actually calling them his friends, doesn’t know when they actually _became_ his friends, but he finds that he doesn’t really mind.

He thinks about his mom, about what she might have thought about his new friends. She’d always wished he had more friends, and she’d undoubtedly be delighted that he had more than one. And he wonders what his friends would think of her, whether they would think she was cool or not, even though Stiles thinks she’s the coolest mom there’s ever been. But he might be biased.

He thinks his mom would like Kira. He thinks his mom _does_ like Kira, from wherever she is, that she’d watched Kira incorporate him into her group of friends with ease and smiled down at them. He thinks his mom’s grateful for Kira, almost as much as he is.

He smiles, hiding it behind his bottle of water, as Kira receives a shove from Danny, who laughs as she returns the favor with compounded interest.

He doesn’t offer an opinion in their current gripe, doesn’t even say much at all, but he feels included nonetheless. Kira sometimes glances at him and offers a genuine smile that he returns just as sincerely, if a bit smaller.

His eyes only skate over to the table at the back of the room once or twice, and they only stay there for a few seconds at most. But every time, Lydia is staring straight at him, that same slightly confused look on her face, and the last time he chances a glance she smiles at him. He has to look away.

His day ends just as every day before has; eating dinner with his dad then doing homework before falling into bed with the burning after image of fiery hair and uncanny eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ya boi is dramatic as hell, though hopefully less so than Beau. Beau could literally be a study in melodrama. but I wanted to keep some of the dramatic tendencies and poetic waxing because i'm weak and i live for boys being very much enamored with their romantic interests


	4. Monsters are Buried Down Deep Inside

Monday is gray. Which isn’t all that different from every other day, but today the clouds are dark and oppressive as Stiles looks out his window in the morning and groans at the development.

It’s not even that he hates the rain--though he definitely does--it’s that the dark clouds make it look like it’s actually dark outside and that is not his definition of a good thing.

He rushes through his routine before jumping into his jeep and heading off to school, hunching his shoulders against the wind curling its way underneath the hood of his jacket.

Once he gets to Physics he gleans it may have been a mistake to come to school today.

Kira is sitting in her seat, as usual, but the look on her face is not one he’s seen before. She looks nervous.

He sits next to her and turns fully to face her, “What’s wrong?” She looks up at him, her lip tucked between her teeth as she worries at it. Something’s definitely not right here.

“Okay, so, don’t be mad.” She starts and Stiles raises an eyebrow, “Right, not a great opening.”

“No, not really.” He says.

“Okay so I might have promised Scott and Danny you’d be there to cheer them on at lacrosse tryouts today.” Kira says and she winces slightly as she says it.

“Okay?” Stiles says, not really understanding what the issue in that is. He’s not entirely happy that he got promised to something without being asked but that doesn’t seem to be the issue here.

“Tryouts are outside and it’s supposed to rain in the afternoon and not, like, a small amount of rain, it’s supposed to be a storm.” Now she actually winces all the way, curling her body and clamping one eye shut.

“And you said I would be there because?” He asks.

“Because I can’t play this season and I don’t wanna be all alone on the bleachers for like three months.” She says, actively pleading with him. He evaluates for a moment. She seems genuinely sorry for having said he would be there, but she wouldn’t hold it against him if he said no. She’s just not that kind of person. And she seems really sad, underneath her nerves, that she can’t play this season.

Stiles hadn’t ever really considered himself a good friend, he’d only ever had one friend his whole life, but right now he wants to be.

“Okay. I’ll sit with you.” He says and her grin practically splits her face in half, “But I can’t promise very much cheer.” He hastens to add.

“Really? Thank you so much, Stiles, I really didn’t wanna be all by myself all season.” She says, grabbing his hand and squeezing it. He doesn’t point out that he only signed on for this afternoon, because if it means making her that happy, he’ll happily sit in the rain for a whole season of lacrosse. Well, not happily, but he won’t complain about it. Too much.

“Yeah, sure.” He says, as though it was no big deal for him to commit to months of sitting on a freezing bench in the rain.

Class gets started and by the time Stiles gets to lunch Scott is grinning.

“Hey thanks man,” Scott greets him with once he sits down, “We were really bummed when we found out Kira couldn’t play and we really would’ve hated to leave her by herself all season--”

“And I wouldn’t let either of them sacrifice their spot--”

“Not that we would have.” Danny says under his breath and Kira smacks him square in the chest without taking her eyes off Stiles, hard enough to knock the breath out of him with a small _oof._

Stiles chuckles.

“So, thank you.” Scott finishes and Stiles smiles.

“Sure.” He says, “Wouldn’t want to make her be the only one in town cheering you on.” Stiles says and grins when Scott laughs and Danny glowers at him. “That would just be rude.”

His predictions about the event of sitting on a freezing metal bench with Kira end up being one-hundred-percent correct. It is--in fact--pouring rain, and he finds Kira sitting under a yellow umbrella with a blanket spread over her legs near the top of the bleachers.

He sits next to her and she offers him her thermos with a smile. Drinking hot chocolate under a yellow umbrella and surprisingly warm blanket probably isn’t the worst way to spend an afternoon, but he’s still not thrilled

Tryouts start and Stiles doesn’t have any idea how any team members could be picked under the ridiculous amount of rain being dumped on them. The phrase _raining buckets_ finally has meaning to him.

“Hey, I think I might have another raincoat in my car if you want it?” Kira says and goes to unwrap herself and get up so Stiles puts a hand on her knee to stop her.

“I can go get it.” He says, “Red Honda?” He asks and she nods, giving him her keys.

“It’s got a blue equal sign bumper sticker!” She calls out to him as he walks away and he waves a hand up to her.

He makes his way there and with numb, slippery fingers he unlocks it to grab the jacket she’s talking about. He has to almost crawl into the backseat of her car to get it but gets it he does and emerges again.

He hears a sound, jarring and out of place, and looks up to notice a few things all at once.

First, Lydia is standing at the entrance to the school, obviously just leaving the building and at least ten yards away from him. Second, a black pickup is sliding its way towards him so fast he doesn’t have time to move. Third, Adrenalin doesn’t actually make things go in slow motion; everything around him seems to be happening faster than normal, if anything.

The black pickup is pivoted to the side, the left side of its front bumper about to make contact with Kira’s back bumper, where Stiles is currently standing. He doesn’t have time to jump out of the way.

He shuts his eyes, not even having time to think about it, just a reactionary motion that his body does for him.

Something slams into him and he’s sure he’s done, that's it for him. But then he hits the ground. It rises up to meet his head and shoulder and he can almost hear the sloshing of his brain against his skull. He has a second to think _that’s probably not good_ before the pain actually sets in.

He groans, for lack of anything else to do, really.

“Fuuu’ tha’ hur’s” He slurs.

“Stiles, stay where you are, don’t try to move. You’re going to be fine.” He hears a voice say, and he knows exactly whose voice it is. He could recognize that voice in his sleep.

Lydia Argent is right next to him, making an attempt to comfort him, and she somehow pulled him out of the way of a pickup truck barreling towards him when he barely had time to shut his eyes. Her hand is resting against the truck above him and the metal around her hand is bent in the exact shape of it.

“How?” He asks, intending to say more but the pounding in his head takes a turn for the worst and he groans again. He tries to roll over onto his side and curl up into an unmanly ball but something very hard and with little resistance holds him where he is.

Lydia’s hand is on his shoulder, holding him to the ground. It’s warm, warm enough that he can feel it through the layers of his clothes, and small, only wrapping part of the way around his shoulder. But he can’t get it to budge an inch.

Maybe he really is out of it.

“Don’t move.” Lydia commands and Stiles can’t find it within his very, very minimal current physical abilities to argue with her.

“It’s cold.” He complains, because he’s right, and if he’s going to have to not move he’d like to do the not-moving somewhere that isn’t the freezing ground with rain pelting his face.

He hears her giggle and though it’s so not the time, and a ridiculously un-funny moment, he can’t help but smile a wobbly, most-likely-concussed smile. Making Lydia laugh is at the top of his list of ‘Greatest Achievements’.

The rest of the world crashes back in and he hears screaming. Then he hears teachers making commands and then sirens a ways away. He thinks he might be losing time, coming in and out of awareness, but to his credit he is probably concussed and also being touched by Lydia Argent. He thinks he has some right to be a little discombobulated.

He hears his dad’s voice shouting for him over the sound of the crowd and he groans again.

“‘M fine.” He says, his voice quieter than he wants it to be.

“He’s alright.” Lydia calls, looking up over the bed of the truck. Stiles wants to turn his head to see his dad and confirm for him that he’s okay, but he’s not really sure what the consequences of that would be, either from his own brain or from the surprisingly strong and impossibly fast girl currently still holding his shoulder in an iron grip.

It takes all of the emergency personnel there, the gym teacher, and maybe one or two lacrosse players to get the cars apart and away from Stiles and Lydia so they can get stretchers in. They put a neck brace around Stiles’ neck and he groans internally.

He finally gets to see who was driving the truck and recognizes her from his Lit class. She’s bleeding, that much he can see, but then he’s moved and he can’t see her anymore. He wants to see what happened to Lydia, wants to know if she’s still there but he can’t.

He hears his dad coming up to the stretcher and he leans over it to look at Stiles.

“I’m fine, I promise.” Stiles says, because while it hurts like a bitch, he’s feeling less and less foggy as time goes by. It helps to not be on the freezing ground anymore, even though his clothes are thoroughly soaked.

“Is he?” His dad asks the nearest EMT and she tells him that Stiles most likely has a concussion but they won’t know the severity until he gets to the hospital and checked out by the doctor on call. Then he hears Lydia’s voice and can see just the edge of her gray coat in his limited field of vision.

“That’s my mother, I’ll ride with you.” She says and even if the EMTs could argue with her she climbs into the cab without further preamble. Stiles giggles, then regrets it as his dad looks down at him with worrying levels of concern in his eyes.

“I’m fine.” Stiles says, more insistently this time as he’s being loaded into the ambulance.

The hospital is just as horrendous as the one in Beacon Hills and he dislikes it about the same amount too. He’s transported to a room that’s just a long line of hospital beds separated by curtains that’s occupied with only one other person, currently sleeping.

He’s deposited on a bed and he wants to sit up and makes to do so before Lydia’s there again, pushing him down by his shoulder.

“You are exceptionally stubborn.” She remarks and he smiles up at her.

“Thank you.” He says and she bites back a smile. The girl who’d been driving the other car gets put in the bed next to Stiles and she immediately starts apologizing.

“Stiles, I’m so sorry, I just lost control, I didn’t mean to--”

“It’s okay,” Stiles says, “I’m fine, really.”

“God I could’ve killed you.” She says, a little hysterically.

“But you didn’t. Lydia pulled me out of the way.” Stiles says, even though he’s not entirely sure that’s what happened, “So it’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” He yawns. It’s weird that he’s tired, though he supposes after the day he’s had it’s no surprise.

“God, just tell me what I can do to make it up to you.” She says, her eyes watery and cheeks already streaked with tears and blood.

“Don’t worry about it.” He tells her and, knowing she won’t just stop worrying about it, adds, “We can talk about it after all this is done.”

“Okay. Okay, sure.” She says and lays back against the bed.

“They’re going to take you to get x-rayed and then my mother will come talk to you.” Lydia says and Stiles remembers her saying just last week that Victoria was her aunt.

“Okay.” He says and, true to her word, nurses come in to take him to be x-rayed and he comes out with a mostly clean bill of health.

He gets put back in the same bed and told he can sit up if he feels so inclined but to take it easy and not attempt standing. He won’t push them on that. At least seven times out of ten, getting out of bed in the morning lands him on his ass, and attempting the same thing with impaired abilities? Not a good idea, even by his standards.

He’s told the doctor is on her way and Lydia sits primly on the bed to his left. She smooths her black skirt and folds her hands on top of it, hands that had held a truck away from him. She looks like a model, having been arranged perfectly and told not to move lest she mess up the shot. But he’d watched her arrange herself, watched her gracefully move each limb into perfect order and all she’s doing is _sitting_.

“How are you feeling?” She asks and tilts her head. Her hair is up today, a bun that was probably meant to look messy but only manages to look flawless on her. She’s wearing a dark purple turtleneck and earrings, the dangly kind that swing when she moves her head. She’s as ethereal today as any other day and yet he knows he won’t ever get used to it.

“I’m fine.” He says. Again. Lydia doesn’t look convinced, and her worry would be heartening if he wasn’t so confused as to _how_ she was there to save his life. She had been right outside the doors to the school, and Kira’s car hadn’t been close, at least ten parking spots away. How could she have gotten to him in the space of milliseconds?

“How did you--?” Stiles starts to ask but Lydia’s glare goes a little murderous and he’s cut short, his heart jumping into his throat and his body immediately shouting _danger! danger! danger!_ He remembers that first day with her, when he’d thought there was something about her that made her dangerous, that if she wanted to, she could take a room within moments, and he’s not entirely sure she’d need weapons to do it. Now he understands where that came from, with her brilliant green eyes staring straight into him and looking more animal than human. More monstrous than human.

But that’s ridiculous. _Right?_ He asks himself. This girl is the epitome of nonthreatening, petite and prim--not that there aren’t women who look that way and can still kick ass, he has a healthy respect for Buffy Summers and women of her caliber--but Lydia is just so _small_ , how could she possibly be capable of something like that?

“I was standing right next to you, Stiles.” She says and Stiles goes to shake his head, to deny even though his instincts are screaming at him to _shut up_. He receives a wave of pain for his trouble.

“Ow.” He says, raising a hand up to press against the source even though he knows that won’t help. Then Lydia snatches his hand so her warm one is holding onto his freezing wrist. A chill runs up his arm and down his back, and he’s pretty sure it’s not entirely because he’s cold.

“Don’t touch it.” She says, and although she leaves the _idiot_ off, he can hear it. She’s far too polite to say something like that, but she’s definitely thinking it.

He hears heels in the hallway and turns to see a woman come in wearing a white lab coat.

His first impression of her is that she’s terrifying. Tall and intimidating, short, red hair cropped close to her head and blue eyes so light they’re almost see through, she cuts a silhouette that says, more than anything else, that she could kill you with a glance. Not even a look, nothing so intentional as a look. She could commit murder like it was an afterthought.

And she’s beautiful, the same kind of beautiful as Allison, Jackson, and Isaac, ethereal, statuesque, _unreal_ in her beauty. She’s hard to look at, and hard to look away from.

But not like Lydia. No one’s beautiful like Lydia.

“Mr. Stilinski,” She says offering him a close-lipped smile, “How are you feeling?”

“I’m fine.” He says again, for what feels like the thousandth time.

“Well it looks like you have a small concussion, nothing too serious. I’d recommend you take it easy for at least a week and just come back if you experience any dizziness or trouble with your vision. I definitely wouldn’t recommend acrobatics.” She says, her tone just serious enough that Stiles almost misses the joke. He snorts.

Her lips twitch as she glances up from her clipboard.

“You were extremely lucky, Mr. Stilinski.” She tells him and Stiles finds himself wanting to smile at her. Her voice is softer but deeper than he’d been expecting, and while her appearance lands squarely in the ‘don’t-fuck-with-me’ zone, her voice and general manner land somewhere on the opposite end of the spectrum. She’s oddly calming, leaving him feeling a little less annoyed with the situation in general.

“Lucky Lydia was there so fast.” He says before he can stop the words falling out of his mouth. Dr. Argent looks up from his chart and offers him a close-lipped smile, all of her previous humor falling away completely.

“Yes, lucky indeed.” She says and Stiles has no idea what that means but he looks over at Lydia to see her glaring at the back of Dr. Argent’s head. He looks back at Dr. Argent and finds her expression is just as mild as it had been before.

“You’re cleared to head home, Stiles, but do take it easy. Take Tylenol for the pain and don’t do any physical activity for a few days at the very least.” She says. Stiles goes to nod, then thinks better of it.

“Thanks, can do.” He says and slides off the edge of the bed and works very, very hard to stay upright once his feet touch the floor. He doesn’t need Dr. Argent or Lydia thinking he’s worse than he actually is, when all he really is, is clumsy.

“I’ll walk you out.” Lydia says and Stiles goes to protest, but realizes this actually works out in his favour. Maybe he can get Lydia to tell him how the hell she managed to pull him out of the way of a pickup truck sliding unbelievably fast over wet pavement.  
As soon as they’re around the corner and out of earshot, he asks, “Are you gonna tell me how you got to me in point-five seconds from at least ten yards away?”

“What would you say if I told you no?” She asks, seeming genuinely curious.

“Lydia, seriously, what the fuck was that?” He demands, pissed that she won’t admit to it, to anything at all.

Everything weird about her comes crashing back into focus, like her unnaturally green eyes, her too perfect, too flawless face, too… _much_ to even be fucking _real_. And now she can travel thirty feet in less than a second and stop a careening truck with her bare hand.

“Stiles, you hit your head. I was right next to you.” She tells him and holds his gaze.

“No, you weren’t,” Stiles insists, “You were by the door, I saw you by the door. I didn’t hit my head hard enough to imagine that, Lydia.” He glares back at her.

“What are you looking for here, Stiles? What do you want me to tell you?” She snaps quietly, sweeping her gaze around the hallway.

“The truth!” He almost shouts before remembering where they are, “I want you to tell me the truth.” He enunciates each word as it comes out, making himself very, very clear.

“I have told you the truth. I was standing right next to you.” She repeats and Stiles knows. When someone is lying, they often repeat themselves, driving home the lie, trying to get it cemented into the other person’s head. But he _knows_ she’s lying.

“Your hand left a dent.” He says, and she can’t hide the surprise or the fear at that, even though it’s only there for a second.

“You think this,” She holds up her admittedly small and unassuming hand, “Put a dent in a truck?”

“Yes.” He says, sticking to his guns. He knows he’s right, he knows he’s not crazy, and he knows she’s lying. But he doesn’t know _why_.

“No one would believe you.” She says derisively and he’s taken aback from the venom in her tone.

“I don’t want to tell anyone.” He says, his eyebrows furrowed.

“Then why do you care?” She demands.

“I suppose I just prefer to have my questions answered.” He says, parroting her words from just a few days ago at her. Her eyes widen before she scowls at him.

“You are _astonishingly_ stubborn.” She says. Her expression smooths, “What could I tell you to have you let this go?”

Stiles glares at her, “The truth.” He says again.

“Can’t you just thank me for saving your life?” Lydia’s glare could peel paint but Stiles holds his ground.

“Thank you.” He says. He crosses his arms over his chest and makes no move to walk away. He won’t let this go and they both know it. Her glare persists, and he does his best to ignore how beautiful her anger is, marvelous and monstrous at the same time. It’s like staring down a vengeful goddess. Probably Hera. Possibly even Juno.

“You’ll never let this go.” She says. It’s not a question, or an inquiry. It’s a statement.

“Nope.” He says and her teeth grind together.

“Then I’d recommend you get used to having unanswered questions.” Lydia says and then she’s walking away, graceful legs carrying her through the hospital hallway and making her look phenomenally out of place in the mundane surroundings.

He sighs and makes his way out to the waiting room where almost every single one of his classmates are and his dad rushes up to him, easily ushering him through the throng of ogling teenagers. Scott, Danny, and Kira are standing by the door and Kira immediately engulfs him in a hug. It’s gentle, in deference to his head, but it’s tight and it’s real.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, are you okay?” Kira asks his shoulder and he can feel her shaky breath in her chest and he hugs her tighter.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just a minor concussion, I’ll be good as new in a week or so.” He tells her, giving her one tight squeeze before letting go.

She kisses his cheek and wipes at her eyes with her sleeve, “I’m sorry, I’m kind of a mess.” She says, laughing wetly.

“I get it.” Stiles says, looking over at Scott and looking very intently at him for far, _far_ longer than it should take for him to get the hint. Then he springs into action and puts his arm around Kira. Stiles and Danny lock eyes and share long-suffering looks.

“I should get home, you guys get outta here. I’ll text you later, okay?” He says, trying his hardest to get his ass out of this stupid hospital as fast as possible. “And let me know what happens with your car, okay?”

Kira laughs, “Kayla’s parents are loaded. We don’t have to worry about getting it fixed.” She leans her head on Scott’s shoulder and Scott looks briefly like he might pass out. Stiles has to stifle a laugh.

“Feel better soon, dude.” Danny says and Stiles shoots him a sloppy salute and a wave to the other two before making his way to his dad’s cruiser.

“Oh my god take me home.” Stiles says.

“You got it bud.” His dad starts the cruiser and the muted sound of the engine--at least in comparison to his jeep--makes it all too easy to fall asleep.

When they get back to the house his dad ushers him up the stairs and deposits three ibuprofen into Stiles’ hand and stands there to make sure he takes them. Stiles very maturely makes a face at him before taking them all at once.

Once they finally set in he realizes how exhausted he is and buries himself under his blankets and is out bare seconds after laying down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is one of my favourite chapters. it was also one of the hardest to write. hope that little pattern doesn't continue


	5. If I Say Shut Your Eyes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been so long! Life got in the way of absolutely everything but I'm back on track and hoping to update about five days to a week apart, depending on what I have written. Anyways I hope you enjoy this super long chapter
> 
> Edit: I don't know how to make a functional calendar for any of my stories in any timely manner, so I've had to go back and change things *again* BUT I shouldn't have to do it again (I really, really, don't want to) At any rate, it genuinely doesn't change the story much, it's just something I need to have correct for my own little neuroses

_He’s in the forest, looking around in the dark at all the creeping moss and low hanging branches. The forest is too close, everything is closing in on him, he’s being trapped within it. He starts forward, trying to escape it when he sees her. He doesn’t see her face, doesn’t have to, to recognize her._

_Her red hair flows behind her as though there’s wind flowing through it even though he can’t feel it. Her black dress follows behind her as she glides across the ground, her feet seeming to never touch the ground she moves so fast. She’s graceful, as she always is, and Stiles runs to catch up to her, trips over the roots and slick ground that he can’t see beneath his feet. It’s too dark, his eyes are closed too much, he can’t see anything._

_He tries to open them, tries to catch one more glimpse of her hair, of her dress. He’s wrenching them open, feeling like he’s completing an impossible task._

His eyes are open, and all he sees is his mundane bedroom.

He sits up on his elbows and surveys the room, still seeing the vague impression of the forest around him, and the afterimage of red hair behind his eyelids.

He blows out a breath, harsh and quick.

He shakes his head, trying to clear it away, and immediately regrets it when a wave of pain shoots through his brain. He groans.

“Nice dude.” He says to himself, feeling ridiculous and stupid for dreaming about Lydia. As if it could be anyone other than Lydia.

He pulls himself out of bed and gets ready for school, feeling groggy and sleepy the whole time.

“Woah, woah, woah, what do you think you’re doing?” His dad asks, watching him walk from the bathroom back to his room.

“Getting ready for school?” Stiles says, looking at his dad like he’s crazy.

“You’re not going to school, kid, no way no how.” His dad says, his no-nonsense face fully employed.

“Dad, I can’t just sit around here doing nothing.” Stiles says, looking around the hallway as though it should be obvious that there’s nothing he could possibly do to entertain himself if he doesn’t have school. Which, to be fair, is true with a concussion.

No reading, no TV, no video games, just sitting around trying not to have a headache. It sounds like torture.

“I don’t care, kiddo. You’re not going to school with a concussion. You have to take the time to heal.” His dad says and Stiles glares at him, unable to help himself.

They stare at each other, his dad being his usual unflappable self and Stiles doing his level best to win the staring contest.

Then he deflates completely and hangs his head. “Fine.” He grumbles.

“Get some sleep. And if you so much as step a toe out of this house, I will know.” His dad says, and Stiles doesn’t doubt it for a minute.

“Okay.” Stiles sighs, feeling spectacularly childish and not caring much about it.

He spends a few hours laying in his bed and feeling bored and terrible. He considers buying an audiobook on his phone and listening to that just to stave off the boredom, and surfs the store for a bit without finding anything he actually wants to read. He grumbles and puts his phone down. It hurt his head anyways.

He tosses and turns and tries to go back to sleep like his dad told him to, but he just can’t.

Every time he tries, he sees tiny hands denting the side of a car. Or feels one of those hands on his wrist, overly warm and strong. Shockingly green eyes looking down at him, filled with worry.

Needless to say it’s impossible to sleep with all of that on his mind.

He groans when he checks the clock and it’s only ten a.m.

His phone chimes and he checks it, seeing a text from Scott asking if he wants them--meaning Scott, Kira, and Danny--to bring him lunch and hang out with him during their lunch.

Stiles almost drops his phone with how fast he says yes.

When they get there, they come bearing sandwiches from the sub shop on main street and sodas. Stiles descends on his sandwich with a vigor he hadn’t known he possessed.

“So how’s your head?” Kira asks and Stiles takes brief stock, looking up at the ceiling as though it will tell him.

“Dunno. Hurts a little, I guess.” He says. He wants to ask whether or not Lydia and the other Argents were at school today, but he’s a little afraid of the answer.

And a little frustrated with how badly he wants to ask.

“Kayla’s not in school. I think she also had a concussion.” Kira says and Stiles nods. Makes sense. She did almost kill him with her car.

“That sucks. Speaking from experience.” Stiles says and Danny laughs.

“Yeah it’s not fun. Sitting around with a splitting headache isn’t one of my top five ways to spend my time.” Danny says.

“What are your top five?” Scott asks and Kira laughs.

“You are going to regret asking.” She says through her giggles.

Once Danny gets done describing, in detail, his top five activities Scott is flushed a deep pink and avoiding everyone’s eyes. Stiles chuckles under his breath, feeling warm from their company and the easy way they seem to be able to incorporate him into their circle. He didn’t realise how lonely he had been until he wasn’t anymore.

They leave pretty soon after getting there, only getting about an hour for lunch and needing to drive back to school.

He does his best after that to entertain himself, and it’s easier now, somehow. He resolutely ignores the fact that it may have something to do with how much better he feels having seen his friends.

He cooks dinner for him and his dad and they eat in relative silence as they usually do, content to just exist in the same space. It’s nice.

The next day passes the same, with Kira, Scott, and Danny coming over to hang out for a little while and then Stiles slowly inching through the day until he can make dinner.

The drudgery is interrupted when he gets a text after Scott, Kira, and Danny have already left. He checks his phone to see that it’s from Heather.

 _Hows WA?_ Is all it says but Stiles finds a grin pulling his mouth up and immediately replies.

 _Wet. Hows BH?_ He doesn’t have to wait long for her reply.

 _Boring. Dull. Small. I think Danielle is sick of me._ She replies.

_Well you are incredibly annoying._

_Ha ha very funny im laughing up a storm over here._

Stiles hadn’t realized how much he’d missed talking to her until she’d texted.

 _I can hear it all the way up here._ He teases and chuckles when he gets her response.

 _Can you also hear me kicking your astral ass? Cuz my neighbours can._ As funny as her response is, he knows it comes from a place of hurt. It’s been weeks since he left Beacon Hills, and while he’s been busy living a life up here, he’d left her to live her life down there, without much notice at all. He’s not surprised it took this long to hear from her, and he’s mad at himself for not texting first.

 _Yup. Feelin it too._ He tells her. He takes a deep breath before typing out his next text, I miss you.

It’s a long time before he gets a response.

 _Thats cool. I miss you too_. Stiles winces.

 _I’m sorry._ He tells her, both because it’s true and because he wants to try to fix things.

 _Thats great Stiles. You know what wouldve been greater? Hearing from my best friend without having to text him first. Cuz thats not my job, im not the one who left._ Stiles closes his eyes against the wave of emotions. The stubborn part of him wants to be mad, to righteously claim ‘how dare she?!’ when he’s the one in the wrong here. The self aware part of him knows that he needs to make it right, because it’s him that has to pull the weight of a friendship he put strain on.

_Youre right, its not. And i wish i had texted you, thats what you deserve. Ive been a bad friend and i know it. What can i do to fix it?_

_I dont know, Stiles. I really dont. But i dont wanna lose you either, so i wanna work it out either way. But you gotta understand that these last few weeks have royally sucked. But i also know that i cant be the one monopolizing the emotional conversation cuz you just… went through so much here._

Stiles frowns at his phone and that block of grey text. _I dont have a monopoly on the emotional conversation. There are two people here, yeah? That means that we share, that its a conversation not a monologue. Youre allowed to feel betrayed. And youre allowed to feel conflicted about feeling that. Yes i left cuz horrible things happened to me, and no i dont regret that, but that doesnt mean that i want you to push yourself aside. That would make me an even worse friend than i already am._

 _Youre not a bad friend Stiles._ Heather immediately responds, _youre an idiot and an asshole but youre not a bad friend._

 _Good_. Stiles responds, completely unsure what the hell he’s supposed to say to that. _For what it’s worth, i didnt want to leave *you*, i just wanted to leave. If you could’ve gone with me i would’ve taken you_

It takes a while for Stiles to get a response, but when he does Heather says, _Well thats not worth nothing._

Stiles breathes a sigh of relief,  _Still my best friend?_

_Still your best friend. What the hell else am i gonna go ive known you since infancy_

Stiles laughs _You make an excellent point_

He spends the rest of the day texting Heather, despite the headache it gives him. He’d missed his friend too much to let a concussion get in the way.

But by the time the day ends he’s begging his dad to go to school the next day.

“I promise to take it easy, I swear I’ll come home if I need to, but I’m actually going crazy in here.” Stiles says and he really must look as stir crazy as he feels if his dad’s reaction is anything to go by. He makes a considering face, his eyebrows pulled together, staring at Stiles for a few moments.

“Okay,” Noah says and Stiles grins and his dad rushes to add qualifiers in true dad fashion, “But if you have any trouble at all you come home, you hear me? And I do mean any kind of trouble, headache, trouble seeing things, _anything_.” He stresses and Stiles promises him vehemently. He just wants to get out of the house.

Going to bed that night is easier, knowing he has something to do the next day and won’t feel like his brain is slowly rotting in his skull with how little he’ll be able to do.

As soon as he drifts off, he’s back in the forest, tripping over roots and trying desperately to follow a stroke of red, stark against the darkness of the forest.

He wakes up after what had only felt like seconds. He feels similarly groggy as he gets ready for school.

His dad insists on driving him and Stiles can’t really argue. Operating a car with impaired mental capacities sounds like a bad idea.

Scott is waiting by the curb when he gets there, standing in the rain and looking mildly pathetic. Stiles bites back a grin.

“I’m not incapable you know.” Stiles says when Scott takes his backpack from him and pulls it over his shoulder.

“I didn’t say you were.” Scott says innocently and Stiles rolls his eyes before letting it go. It’s a battle he’s not entirely willing to fight, and he’s actually incredibly touched by the gesture. It’s not all that bad, having friends.

“Do you think you’ll be willing to sit with Kira during practice today?” Scott asks, going for nonchalant but missing by a mile. Ah, so he was sucking up. That makes sense to Stiles. He almost brushes the previous kindnesses off, but this is _Scott_ , he doesn’t have a subterfuge-savvy bone in his body. All his actions are genuine, if they weren’t, it would go against his puppy-personified personality.

Stiles shrugs, “We’ll see, I guess.” He says, meaning he really has to ask his dad if he can rather than just blindly agreeing. Which isn’t to say that he doesn’t _normally_ just blindly agree to things and beg forgiveness later, but in his current condition he thinks that will land him in way more trouble than he’s willing to deal with.

When he walks into history after homeroom he sees Lydia sitting at their table, looking a little different now than the last time he saw her. Maybe a little less vibrant. But no less staggeringly beautiful. It still leaves him a little breathless to look straight at her.

“Hey.” Stiles says cautiously to Lydia, trying not to watch her out of the corner of his eye and failing miserably. She’s writing something in her notebook, probably just what’s written on the board but it’s so gorgeously written that Stiles can’t imagine that it could be anything short of wedding invitations. He’s seen wedding invitations less ornate than Lydia’s history notes.

“Hello, Stiles. Aren’t you supposed to be at home?” She asks without looking up. Stiles can see a dusting of blush on her cheeks and a little bit of mascara spread over her lashes and he thinks that’s simply unfair. A girl that beautiful hardly needs makeup to enhance that.

“I couldn’t spend another second at home, trust me the only reason I lasted as long as I did is because I thought my dad might send one of his deputies to pull me out of class if I tried to go to school.” Stiles says and Lydia’s lips twitch. Stiles heart does something medically worrying.

“I can’t imagine going to school is more entertaining than anything else.” Lydia says.

“It’s more interesting than staring at a wall and trying to stave off the headaches.” He says, shrugging. He feels a little breathless, sitting this close to her after so long away. Truly he just has to build up a tolerance and then someday he won’t feel like passing out in the middle of a conversation. _Yeah, totally plausible scenario,_  he thinks.

“Yes I suppose it would be.” She says vaguely, still looking down at her notebook. “How is your head?”

“Fine I guess.” He says and she looks up at him for the first time since he sat down and something _is_ different. Her eyes are similarly less vibrant. Still a breathtaking green, but somewhat…less. Less something. With a colour originally indescribable it’s impossible to describe the changes to it. But it is different, that much he’s sure of.

Mr. Parker starts class and effectively ends Stiles’ excuse for staring at her.

The class drags while Stiles does his best to block out the fact that Lydia is _right there_ and still dazzling in every way.

She’s wearing jeans today, a dark blue pair that’s tucked into gray socks and a pair of black boots. Her shirt is white and somewhat see-through, and he can see a gray lacy tank top through it. He wishes it was easier to look away from her than it is.

Her hair hangs in scarlet curls that still seem to shine even under the harsh fluorescent lights in their classroom. He notices tiny braids mixed in with the rest of it.

He tears his eyes away and tries to pay attention to what Mr. Parker is saying only to feel her eyes on him after only a few minutes. She’s doing the same thing she did on his first day in class, staring straight at his head and seeming to want to scoop out the contents, a line creasing the space between her perfect eyebrows.

He wants to ask her what the hell she’s looking for but he’s pretty sure he wouldn’t understand the answer she’d give him if he did.

So he lets her do it and tries to ignore the goosebumps rising all over the right side of his body.

When class ends, he stands and packs his things while Lydia primly swings her bag over one shoulder and folds her coat over her arm. She pulls her hair over one shoulder and Stiles tries to remember how to breathe.

She has a scar on her jaw, one he hadn’t noticed until just now. He can’t make out what it is, or what might have made it. He doesn’t want to stare long enough to find out. Or, rather, he doesn’t want to get _caught_ staring.

He tears his eyes away and nods to her as he leaves the class.

“Stiles?” She calls and Stiles immediately turns around, spinning so fast he almost loses his balance.

“Yeah?”

“Be careful.” She says and her intensity throws him through a loop. It’s like she’s either genuinely worried about him, or that she’s worried he’s still going to ask her questions about her impossibly saving his life. He supposes both could be true, but why would a girl so…inexplicable be worried about him?

“Sure.” He says before almost falling out of the classroom and into the arms of Scott, who happened to be waiting outside his class.

“Woah bro, you good?” Scott asks, steadying him with hands on his arms. He examines his forehead as though he might be able to see if the concussion was getting worse through Stiles’ skull.

“Yup. Fine.” Stiles says, a flush rushing up his neck as Lydia giggles quietly behind him and gracefully walks past them.

“If you’re sure.” Scott says, taking his hands away but leaving them hovering there in case he needs them. Stiles swats one of them away and glares at him and Scott raises his hands in surrender, his lips twisted up into a half smile.

Scott talks about a whole lot of nothing as he walks Stiles to his engineering class unnecessarily. Stiles listens with one ear and about an inch of his brain while the rest of it is devoted to trying to decipher every interaction he’s ever had with Lydia Argent.

He can’t make sense of any of it, why she’s so intent to understand him, why she always acts distant after a bout of talking to him, why she would stop a car from hitting him and how she managed to stop that car in the first place. And now, she’s cryptically warning him and it only feels somewhat selfish. She seems to be at least a little bit worried for him, which he can’t even attempt to understand.

“So Kira wants to go to the beach in a couple weeks, if you’re down.” Scott says and Stiles tunes right in.

“Why?” He asks.

“Why am I inviting you or why does she want to go to the beach?” Scott asks, his eyebrows furrowing.

“Both, I guess.” Stiles says.

Scott shrugs, “I’m inviting you because she told me to, and because we want you to go with us, and she wants to go to the beach because she likes hanging out with the Hales and they go to the beach on sunny weekends. We have to wait until there’s gonna be a sunny weekend though. It’s still too early in the year to have them yet.” Scott shrugged, as though that wasn’t the most depressing thing Stiles had ever heard.

“Ah.” Stiles says, “See, in California, we experience this thing called ‘sunshine’.” Scott smacks him and Stiles grins at him.

“So? Do you think you can go?” Scott asks, pointedly ignoring Stiles’ snark.

“I mean, maybe? I’m not sure how much fun I’ll be. I don’t really swim or anything.” Stiles says and Scott laughs.

“Dude, neither do any of us, only the Hales are crazy enough to swim in water that cold. No we just hang out on the beach and look at the tide pools. Plus when it gets dark we make a bonfire and eat s’mores. It’s more like camping than going to the beach, really.” Scott explains and Stiles considers.

It doesn’t sound all that bad, considering.

“Yeah, sure. I’ll go.” He agrees and doesn’t give himself the chance to think about it. If he does, he’ll decide not to. And he’s only just now made any friends; he kind of wants to keep them.

He’s somewhat startled by how much.

Engineering with Danny is actually kind of interesting. They’re given a project and have to design it using a computer program. Learning to use it ends up being pretty fun. Stiles hasn’t really enjoyed his school work up till this point, he’s been using it to avoid thinking about anything else.

When they get to lunch Stiles tries to keep his eyes on his own table, and fails miserably. He can’t help looking over at the Argents’ table, can’t help watching Lydia’s hands.

He remembers seeing the metal of a car door wrapped around them and he _knows_ what he saw. He didn’t hit his head that hard, definitely not hard enough to imagine that.

His brain tries to supply him with logical explanations first, throwing around words like ‘adrenaline rush’ and ‘hysterical strength’. But even then, people who exhibited hysterical strength often seriously injured themselves while doing it. And Lydia was fine, more than fine even. When they were at the hospital she looked cool as a cucumber.

No, there’s no way it’s logical. So his brain moves on to less realistic theories. Radioactive spiders, magic, a cocktail of radiation and hormones. Hell, even aliens make an appearance on that list. He scowls at himself for that one.

So he just watches her, glad that she’s facing slightly away from him. It doesn’t stop him from seeing his favourite features, her red hair, the slender arc of her back, her hands. The only things he’s missing are her eyes. She has amazing eyes.

He ignores the flurry of thoughts in his head as long as he can, focusing on her. She always makes him lose his train of thought.

His day continues somewhat in a daze, as though he’s not even there. He watches lacrosse practice with Kira, and she seems to know he’s in a weird mood, so she pretty much leaves him alone.

He goes to a game with her on Friday night, and on Saturday and Sunday he does chores and pretends he doesn’t see his dad shoot him concerned glances when he over exerts and has to take a break. It’s overall uneventful and by the time he’s ready to go to bed on Sunday night he thinks he won’t dream about her.

He’s wrong.

_He’s in the forest again, but the background noise isn’t. The noise sounds like a parking lot, like shoes scraping against wet pavement and Stiles recognizes it._

_He recognizes the sound of the truck careening towards him, hears the squealing, splashing sound of it advancing and holds his breath as he shuts his eyes. He’s prepared, he’s ready to die. There’s nothing he can do about it but accept._

_And then there’s a shriek, a shriek that sounds like his name and his eyes fly open again, seeing Lydia move so fast she’s a red smudge in his vision. She’s racing towards him and she knocks him over. He yells after her, knowing that if the truck doesn’t hit him, it will hit her. She sends him flying and into the ground so hard he jolts awake._

He jolts in his bed, his heart pounding in his ears. His breath comes quick and labored, and he works to slow both, sitting up and focusing on his breathing, forcing it to be even.

It takes a while, but he gets it under control.

He falls back onto his sheets and rolls over onto his side.

He stares at the wall. It makes sense that he’d dream about the crash. It was a traumatic experience, something he’s probably not going to forget anytime soon.

He tries to get back to sleep, tosses and turns for hours before falling into an exhausted sleep once he can see the sun lightening the gray of the sky.

He wakes up to the sound of his alarm and groans at it before getting up and getting ready for school.

The sky is as gray as it ever is and he’s almost used to the lack of sun now.

Once he gets to history, the class he had been keyed up for, he sees Lydia and the stress and anxieties he’d had all but wash away. Why did it matter how she saved his life? He’s alive to look at her, to see her sitting in this mundane high school classroom looking a thousand times better than any actor or model he knows of, and is more than willing to accept that lot in life if it is, in fact, his lot.

He sits next to her, his heart beating faster than it reasonably should be.

“Hi Lydia.” He says and she hums an acknowledgment and tilting her chin towards him before looking back down at her notebook.

And that’s the last contact he has with her for weeks.

Every day he’s in class with her she acts as though he isn’t there, acts like she still has the desk all to herself.

And he can’t figure out why.

He hadn’t told anyone about her involvement in the crash, hadn’t said anything to anyone about her weird abilities. He’d been on his best behavior, as far as he’s concerned, and can’t figure out how he’s supposed to respond now. Does he try to make her talk to him? Does he try to tell her he hasn’t said anything, that he doesn’t plan to?

He doesn’t do either of those things.

He resigns himself to no longer having her in his life. Distant and beautiful as she is, he can’t vie for her attention anymore. She’s unwilling to give it, it seems.

And he’s above seeking her attention anyways. At least, he tries to be. It doesn’t change the fact that all he wants is to see her eyes again, to see her dimples in their full glory. He wants to hear her laughter that sounds like violins and flutes and sonatas and concertos.

He just wants her to care that she’s gone from his life, even though he knows there’s no way she does. He’s a random face in a crowd of mediocre faces when she looks like a goddess among men. He can’t compete.

Not that he wants to.

Because Lydia had never been an option. He’d meant it, when he’d talked to his dad that first time about her. She hadn’t been a prospect, hadn’t been someone who did anything so normal and…silly as dating. Lydia Argent is too extraordinary, too idiosyncratic to be given a title so pedestrian as ‘girlfriend’.

And that’s fine. There are other people in the world.

So Stiles lets it go, ignores the fact that he still can’t keep his eyes off her table, still can’t stop looking out of the corner of his eyes at her during class. He can’t do anything about those anyways. And he accepts.

But he doesn’t stop noticing.

The changes, which he’d seen when he came back to school, were consistent. The vibrancy--as he'd started referring to the changes in hers and her family's appearances, for lack of a better word--returned after about four days, and took another four to wane again. It’s in their eyes, the darkness in them towards the end of the cycle. And in her flush, something he notices on the other three as well. Their skin looks flushed at the beginning of the cycle, every high point, everywhere blood runs closer to the surface is pink when he sees them again. And Stiles sees Lydia in particular try to hide it with clothes, but she can’t hide the changes to her face.

The worst part about that is that it makes her all the more gorgeous. Stiles finds himself looking forward to the days following the darkest stage in her green eyes. The flush lasts only one, and he never misses it.

He sees the obsession setting in and makes a conscious effort to ignore it. He spends more time with his friends, with his dad. He invites his friends over to his house, lets them meet his dad.

His dad gives him this look the first time he brings them over. It’s a confusing one, full of so many emotions, but Stiles knows what he’s trying to say.

His mother would be proud of him.

He doesn’t know what he's meant to be able to do with that knowledge and he thinks it’s almost astounding how many things he doesn’t know. The list keeps growing longer and longer. 


	6. The Moon is Always Full for Us, the Road is Always Clear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was on time! I was sure I wasn't going to be and it was very close as it's now 12:42 a.m. but I did it! This chapter is lacking in Lydia material, I'm sorry to report, however there's lots of friendship bantering and sarcastic ribbing so I hope that makes up for it. Thank you guys so much for the kudos and I hope you continue to enjoy my fic!

Stiles isn’t normally someone who does things over breaks, at least he hasn’t been in years. And especially after leaving the one place he’d lived his entire life he’s adrift in what he should be doing over Spring Break, in the time leading up to it.

Until he gets a phone call the last day of school before break.

It’s Heather, and he picks up immediately.

“Hey lady, what’s up?” He greets and Heather laughs on the other end.

“Lady?” She asks breathlessly once she's recovered.

“Hey, I’ve called you worse.” Stiles points out and Heather breaks off into more peals of laughter.

“I think 'homeslice' might be my personal least favourite.” She says and Stiles snorts.

“Yeah, not my finest moment.” He winces at the memory, “But you didn’t answer my question, what’s up?”

“Oh!” She says, “Yeah, so I called to let you know that I’ll be there tomorrow night, probably around, umm, seven?”

Stiles waits a minute, sees if his brain will get on board and comprehend the sentence that just transferred over the phone. It doesn’t. “Wait, what?”

“Didn’t I tell you?” Heather says, the tone of her voice telling him she never meant to tell him, “I’m coming up for a few days over spring break to see you.” She says it so simply, as though it’s the easiest thing in the world, to just drive eleven hours to see someone you had seen two months ago.

“No, you didn’t.” Stiles says, his confusion bleeding away to excitement, “Are you sure you want to do that? It’s freezing up here, and wet as hell. I just want you to know what you’re getting into because you’re clearly serious.”

“Deathly, actually.” She says, and Stiles can hear the grin in her voice.

“Why?” He asks, even though he already knows.

“Because I miss you. And I want to see you. And because your dad asked me to.” She says and Stiles snorts at the last one. It sounds like his dad.

“Seven tomorrow?” He asks and she gives him an affirmative, “You do realise I have to get my entire house ready with barely more than twelve hours to do so? We still have boxes literally everywhere.”

“Stiles,” Heather says, exasperated and Stiles can almost see her arched eyebrow, “You know I don’t give a shit. Like, not even one.”

Stiles snorts, “I know you don’t. If you could live in an actual pigsty I’d bet actual money that you would.” Heather gasps on the other end and if she’d been here, she would’ve smacked him as hard as she could. And she’s much stronger than she looks.

“That’s so rude! Who raised you, Stilinski? No, never mind, Noah has no stake in this, this is all you.” She says and Stiles laughs, trying to cover up the hole being ripped through his chest. His mother had loved Heather, found a kindred spirit in her sarcasm and her big heart.

“Seven tomorrow?” Stiles asks, someone impressed with himself when his voice remains mostly light and uncaring.

“Seven tomorrow.” Heather confirms, chipper.

“And you’re just going to drive here? For eleven hours?”

“Eleven hours is nothing Stilinski. I’ll listen to _Fellowship_ on the way.” She says and Stiles can’t help the chuckle that escapes at that.

“Don’t fall asleep.” He cautions with false sincerity.

“Just because your attention span lasts approximately eight minutes doesn’t mean the rest of us can’t enjoy a fantasy classic that isn't wrought with constant action.”

“They walk for three hundred pages, Heather, _three hundred_.” Stiles implores but he’s grinning.

“Yes and other stuff. You’re just too uncultured and undevoted to appreciate it.”

“Is ‘undevoted’ even a word?” He asks, moving his phone to rest between his ear and his shoulder as he lets himself into his house.

“I don’t see why not.” She says, almost thoughtfully. “Stop distracting me, I have to pack.”

“I’m not the one who called me.” Stiles points out.

“Well I think you might have actually had a panic attack if I hadn’t called before just showing up at your house tomorrow so…”

“Yeah, yeah. Fine, go pack, I’ll see you in--” He looks to the clock on top of the oven, “--twenty-seven hours.”

“It’s a date.” Heather says and hangs up. Stiles looks down at his phone, the stupidest, biggest, sappiest grin stretching his whole face painfully wide.

For an afternoon, the world is brighter, the green of Washington so unbelievably _green_ and the lonely blues of his house seem so much less lonely. His problems--the stress of the week, the concerns about colleges, and the stupidly stubborn image of red and green that’s been firmly cemented in his head no matter how much he’s tried to wrench it out--just fade. It’s like everything looks up for a bit.

He cleans, as he’d said he was going to, and finishes unpacking the last of their things, the unnecessary and most often decorative aspects of their lives which neither had felt particularly inclined to unpack. But now he hangs paintings and pictures, dusts the mantle to arrange photos and knick knacks, and finally hangs their curtains. By the time he’s done and his father unlocks and opens the door, their house is an actual home.

“Stiles, what happened?” His dad asks, surveying every aspect of the house he can see with wide eyes and a sad expression on his face.

At first, Stiles wonders if he shouldn’t have, if he should’ve left the homely items of their house in the boxes and continued to act as though they didn’t exist. But he finds he doesn’t want to, hadn’t wanted to even when he had been.

His father walks over to the mantle, the exact place Stiles had known he would go first. In the middle--next to a photo of Stiles, his father, and his mother at the Trail of Lights what must have been five years ago by now and a candid of his parents during their wedding, a personal favourite of Stiles--sits the mug that had been unpacked that first day, with the spring green handle and sky blue body, which before now had been placed carefully, reverently back within the packing foam and promptly pushed aside.

His father walks over to it and touches the ceramic for a moment. He shuts his eyes and breathes deeply.

“It’s great, Stiles.” He says and Stiles smiles. It’s a small, sad affair, the bare uptick of lips that’s gone seconds after it starts. It’s the smile for his mom, the after portion of his life, the hole in his chest, and the missing chunks of his soul. But it’s real, small and sad as it is.

His dad mirrors it.

Stiles finishes the last of his afternoon-long project and then makes sandwiches for him and his dad, completely lacking in the energy to do anything more extravagant.

That night, feeling optimistic for the first time in a long time, with this proof that he can have both the life he’d led and the one he was leading now and that he wouldn’t have to give one or the other up, he falls asleep easily.

_The forest is the same as it always is, dark shades of green and brown, black where shadows collect and white where the moon reflects off her pale skin. The orangey-red of her curls is turned crimson in the darkness and hangs in a perfect curtain down her back, looking like water when she moves. The black gown she wears is skin tight to her knees, where it flares out dramatically to trail behind her, and has the lowest v-neck he’s ever seen, plunging all the way down to below her sternum._

_Her pale hand stands out stark against the tree she rests it on, her nails a sharp, deep red. She turns her head, her hair sliding over her shoulder with the movement, and looks back at him._

_Her eyes are a pitch, deep black. Her teeth are sharp and glistening when she peels back her lips in a gruesome approximation of a smile. Her laugh is just as musical as it has always been, with a threatening and exhilarating edge._

_“You already know.” She says and his dream self must make a face of confusion because she laughs again, “You already know the truth, don’t you, Stiles?”_

Stiles wakes with a start, his breath coming in pants and his heart lodged completely in his throat.

He tries to cling to the dream, to remember more than the red and the black and the white of the subject, but it’s a lost cause and he knows it. He’s never been able to remember before, it’s unlikely he’ll just suddenly start.

He has this dream almost every night, though he can’t be sure if all the details of it are the same every time.

He shakes his head at himself, trying to clear it as well as show his disappointment in some physical way.

He rolls over and tries to calm his heart rate enough to go back to sleep. After what must be hours he’s successful and drops back into an exhausted doze.

He wakes up the next day with the sun slanting through his bedroom window. He gasps and runs to the window gracelessly, tripping over the shoes left by his bed last night and the blankets still wrapped around his legs.

The sun is out today and much higher in the sky than Stiles thinks it should be. He glances back at his alarm clock to see that it’s now one in the afternoon and he’d slept through almost the entire day.

Well at least it would be less time waiting for Heather to show up.

He calls her before he can change his mind about it.

“Stiles you’re cutting off the good part.” She complains as an answer. Stiles snickers.

“That’s what she said.” He says and Heather cackles.

“Like you have any idea at all what she says.” Heather teases and Stiles laughs. His complete lack of any sexual experience is often the butt of jokes, as is hers.

There’d been a brief moment, one night at a party neither of them had wanted to be at in Junior year, where they’d been drunk and happy and had entertained the idea of getting it out of the way with each other. No strings attached, no lingering feelings, just best friends losing their virginities to each other. But in the end they hadn’t, lacking protection and common sense. The next day they’d been desperately glad they hadn’t. Heather had never been more than a friend to him and he was the same to her. It would have changed their dynamic irreversibly.

“And you do?”

“Maybe.” She says cryptically and Stiles snorts.

“Yeah, okay.” He scoffs. She giggles.

“Why are you calling me while I’m driving?” She asks and Stiles has to retrace his mental steps for a couple seconds. Heather waits patiently, used to his ADD making him forget every thing that’s ever happened to him.

“Oh!” He almost shouts when he remembers, “I wanted to know if you wanted to go to dinner with some friends of mine tonight?”

“You have friends?” She asks and gasps, “Are you paying people to act like your friends so you don’t look as sad and pathetic as you actually are?”

Stiles makes a supremely unimpressed face to the air in front of him and Heather laughs, hard enough he’s sure she’ll have to wipe tears from her eyes.

“Yeah, yeah, yuck it up over there.” He says and she does.

“Okay, okay,” She says breathlessly after many long moments of hysterical laughter. Stiles has been grinning sappily to his empty room but no one has to know that. “Okay, yes, I’ll meet your friends.”

“Great.” Stiles says and tells her to stay safe and not to hit any deer on her way up before he hangs up.

He then texts the group chat he has going with Scott, Danny, and Kira, asking them if they want to meet his friend from back home tonight. He’s met with resounding yeses from Scott and Kira and a noncommittal sure from Danny. On par for each of them.

Then he sets about taking up six hours worth of time with laundry, cleaning, cooking, and the most ridiculous attempt at homework any one has ever made. As he rounds hour five he gives up and sits on the couch with _The_ _Maze Runner_ sitting open but largely unread on his lap.

He hears tires on their gravel driveway at 6:20 and immediately vaults himself up and out of the house to launch straight into Heather’s open arms. She squeals and holds him in a death grip, her giggles tickling the hair at the nape of his neck.

“Missed you, lady.” He tells her and she hugs him impossibly tighter, letting the endearment slide this time.

“You too.” She mumbles into his neck. Her fingertips scrabble against his shoulder and he holds her tighter, swaying slightly. She takes a rattling breath before releasing him. Her eyes are red, but he politely ignores that.

“You look remarkably good for having sat in a car for eleven hours.” He notes and she rolls her eyes at him. He grins. “Come on, I’ll show you around.”

And show her around he does, concluding at the fact that they don’t have a guest room but she’s welcome to the couch.

She raises her eyebrow at him before dropping her duffel bag in his room and slapping her pillow onto the side of the bed he doesn’t sleep on. Bed sharing isn’t a foreign concept to the two of them, having been friends since birth, so he should have expected as much.

She insists on showering before they meet up with Scott, Kira, and Danny so while she does that Stiles paces, too keyed up to do much of anything else.

She emerges in jeans and a long sleeve shirt that looks like it offers her absolutely no warmth. Stiles laughs.

“Oh no, no, you need an actual jacket or something, that’s not gonna cut it. You will freeze to death.” Stiles says and Heather rolls her eyes but lets him hand her a jacket of his.

He drives them to the one diner in town and they race through the rain to get to the door without being drenched. It's a lost cause but they try anyways.

Kira sees them first and waves like a maniac as though Stiles wouldn't be able to pick her out in a crowd of thousands. Stiles smile and offers a wave back. He sits next to Scott and shoves a chair out for Heather who plops down into it and shrugs off Stiles' overly large jacket which had pretty much swallowed her whole.

"I'm Kira." Kira days, offering her hand to Heather, who takes it and shakes.

"Heather."

"We've known each other since the dawn of time." Stiles explains and Kira rolls her eyes and Heather gives him a long suffering look. Stiles grins.

“Our moms were friends in high school.” Heather explains and Scott laughs.

“That’s Danny and me.” He says.

“Small town lifestyle.” Heather says and Scott holds up his soda in a cheers motion.

Heather glances over her shoulder and does a literal, actual double take before smacking Stiles’ arm. Stiles looks over his shoulder to see what she’s staring at and is confronted with Lydia Argent, resplendent in tight jeans and a white scarf that makes her hair look like fire. She’ standing in line at the counter with her brother, Jackson and her sister, Allison.

“Stiles, what the _fuck_ are they?” Heather hisses in his ear. Stiles shrugs, forgetting for a moment that no one but him was actually seriously considering that question.

“The Argents.” Stiles responds and would swear on his life that he sees Jackson smirk just then. Stiles narrows his eyes.

“I didn’t ask ‘who’ I asked ‘what’.” Heather says and her jaw is literally slackened as she takes them in.

“Which one are you staring at?” Stiles asks conversationally.

“You can choose between them?” Heather whispers.

“Yes.” Stiles says with a laugh, a laugh at his own inside joke, at the fact of his obsession looming threateningly over his shoulder like a spector.

“It’s the redhead isn’t it.” Heather asks and Stiles shoves her with his shoulder, confirming her assumption and making him look like a child all in one go.

“Not a word, Sinclaire.” Stiles says, using her surname as if scolding her, “Not a word.”

“You’re so predictable, Stilinski.” She says and Stiles snorts, turning back to the table.

“I wonder what they’re doing here.” Scott says conversationally.

“Getting food? On a Saturday night? Surely they _must_ be up to something nefarious.” Danny says, rolling his eyes.

“I didn’t even know you knew the word ‘nefarious’.” Stiles says and receives the most withering look he’s ever gotten, which is truly a feat he would’ve previously deemed impossible, living with his father.

“Very mature, Stiles.” Kira says primly and Stiles laughs.

“Yes, it is I, the Patron Saint of maturity.” Stiles says, taking an awkward mock bow from his sitting position.

“It’s good to see you so happy, Stiles.” Scott says and, as in most scenarios, his random bout of earnestness totally catches Stiles off-guard. He feels like he swallows his own tongue.

“Yeah, it is.” Kira agrees and Danny shrugs but somehow it’s clear that he means to replicate the sentiment.

“Uh, thanks, I guess?” Stiles says, equally uncomfortable and endeared.

“I’m really glad he moved here.” Heather says and Stiles looks up, his face probably doing something concerning because she smiles a sad smile, “I mean, I’m not glad you’re not in Physics with me because Mr. Douglas might actually kill me by the end of the semester, but I’m glad you’re here, with more friends than just me, and happy.” She shrugs, leaving off the qualifiers and caveats that no doubt belong there. _Since your mom died_ and _now you’re out of that hell hole_ and _inasmuch as you can be_ among the list.

“Thanks.” He says, feeling his neck and ears grow warm. He lets it slide, mostly because she won’t tolerate an argument, and she won’t let him weasel his way out of actual human emotion, so he just lets it be.

“Okay but seriously, who are those people?” Heather circles back.

Stiles snorts, “The Argents,” He reiterates, “Their mom--well their adoptive mom--works at the hospital. I don’t know the full story, I don’t think anyone does, but they were all adopted by Dr. Argent and her husband. Except Allison, I think she’s really their daughter.”

“They’re really nice--well Lydia and Allison are really nice, Jackson’s kind of an asshole at the best of times and Isaac’s just kind of weird--and just like…crazy attractive. And smart.” Scott says, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen any of them answer a question wrong or get a bad grade.”

“Jeez, what’s in the water here?” Heather asks, whistling. Stiles smacks her knee and she grins at him, throwing another look over her shoulder. “Okay, I picked which one.” she says, biting her lip and looking like a child ready to spill a particularly juicy secret. Stiles barks a laugh, knowing which one without having to ask.

And it has nothing to do with him being the only guy in the bunch, Heather plays for both teams with about as much skill as him which is to say none, but everything to do with his jawline.

“Oh, I know.” Stiles says.

“Jawline could glass, I mean seriously what do they feed them?” Heather asks and Stiles shrugs. “Gotta get me some of that.” She mumbles, almost to herself.

“The food or the guy?” Stiles asks knowing the answer before she says it but asking anyways.

“Fuck, both of them.”

“You’re right, my mistake in asking a bisexual to make a decision.” Stiles says and she smirks at him.

“Not in my nature.” She says, her smirk stretching into a grin.

They get their food and conversation flows easily, Heather and the rest of them getting along really well without any help from Stiles, who’d checked out of conversation quickly to stare as surreptitiously as possible--meaning not at all--at Lydia.

He wonders if she’s with Jackson, like, with him-with him--as middle school as that sounds. They aren’t actually related, so it’s not impossible. And with a guy like that living with her, how could she not? But the way they’re standing, not far away from each other but not close either, the easy conversation that isn’t charged with anything, that looks similar to how Heather and him act if he had to put a finger on it.

So maybe not then.

He wonders, not for the first time--in fact it was probably the thousandth time--what the hell their deal was. Nothing added up, not a damn thing, their weird family situation included. But, he reminded himself, he didn’t care.

Lydia didn’t want anything to do with him, had made that abundantly clear, and he wasn’t going to obsess about someone who doesn’t care about him. At least, he’ll continue to pretend that’s the case.

Nonetheless he knows the moment they leave the diner. He watches Allison and Jackson leave with a bag of food and Lydia follows them out but not before she darts a look behind her and her eyes lock with Stiles’. His breath leaves him in a _whoosh_ , his heart rate ratchets up to unhealthy levels, and he forgets how to blink. Then the moment is over, her green--and oh how inadequate a word that is--eyes leaving his as though they hadn’t even paused there.

They finish dinner and Stiles takes Heather back to his house after promising many times over that they’d hang out again before spring break was over.

“You’re friends are really cool.” Heather tells him sincerely in the car ride home.

“Thanks. I think so too.” He says, smiling.

“I’m really glad you found them Stiles.” Stiles’ shoulders rise ever so slightly, hunched against the onslaught of sincerity from someone with whom he spends most of his time being one-hundred-percent insincere. But Heather is just like that, sometimes it’s hard to tell if anything is genuine and other times it’s like everything out of her mouth is so, so _earnest_ and heartfelt that you wonder how she ever said anything sarcastic, her stupidly blue eyes going round and serious, as though it’s imperative that Stiles understands what she’s saying.

It’s not a bad quality in a friend.

“Yeah.” Stiles says, his voice slightly thicker than before, “Me too.” She reaches over and grabs his hand, holds it in both of hers.

The rest of the week continues in much the same way, spending time with Stiles’ friends, watching movies with Heather, vegging out on the couch, spending time with his dad. He and Heather even drive up to Seattle for a day to see the sights but they both find it kind of underwhelming.

By the time the week is drawing to a close, Kira and Heather are finishing each other sentences, Danny has smiled at Heather a collective eight times the amount he has at Stiles, and Scott would probably die for her.

All in all, Stiles would say it was a success.

And, beyond that, he’d forgotten what it was like to be around her so much. To be in her space all the time and in on the joke and _happy_ in only the way she knew how to make him.

And it hadn’t just been since he’d left Beacon Hills, it had started long before then. He honestly couldn’t say the last time he’d watched a movie and enjoyed it the whole way through with her. His mom’s death had really thrown a wrench in everything, but now he was kind of starting to get why people say it’s important to have a support system, to have friends around when you’re going through grief. If nothing else, he knows his mom likes seeing him happy, wherever she is.

And that makes almost anything worth it.

Right before she leaves on Friday at 6:00 a.m. and as she’s hugging him she whispers in his ear, “Talk to the girl, Stiles, or I swear to God I will do something drastic.” She squeezes him tighter, almost as a warning. Stiles considers playing dumb, then pretending he didn’t hear her, or just ignoring her altogether. But, as it stands, he is a weak man who is afraid of his five-foot-nothing best friend more than he lets on.

He makes a noncommittal gesture and she accepts it, knowing she won’t get much better.

Stiles watches her car until he can’t see it anymore and feels it physically when it turns out of his line of sight. He knows it’s not the last time he’s ever gonna see her, but it still feels like the hole that’d been slowly healing while she’d been here gets ripped open part of the way. It’s not all undone, but it still does a number on him.

He goes inside and goes back to sleep.


	7. The Truth is Hiding in Your Eyes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I...might have gone crazy with this chapter. Like...just a little bit. It's very long and also entirely self indulgent, I won't lie. I abandoned the source material for a moment, just for fun. Also the formatting for this chapter is going to be a bit different because my keyboard broke on me and I haven't been able to get a new one yet, so thank you in advance for your flexibility. Anyways, I hope you guys like it, and I wanted to thank all of you for the kudos and hits, I genuinely couldn't have foreseen this attention, but I'm delighted all the same. Thank you! Enjoy :)

“So, you’re still going to the beach this weekend, right?” Kira asks him on a random Thursday about two weeks after spring break, in front of his history class, “It’s supposed to be sunny this weekend and the Hales are planning to do a bonfire.” Her eyes sparkle with excitement and Stiles briefly wonders who would be able to respond with a negative with her looking at them like that. Of course he was still going. 

“Yeah, I’ll be there.” Stiles says and even finds he’s looking forward to it. 

“Great!” She says and grins. He grins back, completely unable to help himself. 

“Well I’ve gotta get to class,” She says and she adjusts her bag, “I’ll see you at lunch.” 

“See you.” He says and gives her a wave. He sighs internally as he heads into his class. 

He sits in his seat and removes his notebook, opening it to a clean page and digging around in his bag for a pen. He’s sure he still has one in there. 

“The beach?” He hears next to him and it stops him dead. Part of it is just pure shock at hearing her voice after roughly six weeks, the other part is that he’s not even remotely prepared to talk to her.

He doesn’t want to look up, doesn’t want to look at her. He knows once he does all will be forgiven as long as he gets to stare at her. And he doesn’t want that. She doesn’t get to just dip in and out of his life like that, saving his life and seeming to want to be friends until suddenly she drops him again for _over a month._ He doesn’t want her to get it in her head that she can do that. It’s not fair. 

He sits back up and stares straight ahead. 

“Yup.” He says.

“Why the beach?” She asks, her musical voice pulling him in against his will. He doesn’t look at her, clinging to the last defense he has. He pulls his notebook out of his bag and tries--no doubt uselessly--to write out the beginnings of lecture notes. 

“Because Kira wants to go to the beach.” He explains. Lydia sighs. 

“Stiles…”

“Nope. Don’t even try it.” He says, fully and one-hundred-percent not in the mood. 

“I am sorry for the way I’ve behaved. It isn’t fair to you.” She says and he can feel remorse in her voice.

“Nope. It isn’t.” He let’s that hold in the air, lets it sink in that she’s not forgiven in the slightest. “Is there something you want, Lydia?” He asks, still looking at the board and ignoring the thrill that goes through him at saying her name. Because it’s stupid. 

“I wanted to talk.” She says. 

“Then talk.” 

She sighs. “I’m sorry.” 

“I don’t care. Why do you? I’m just a random guy.” 

“You’re not ‘just a random guy’,” The phrase seems out of place in her vernacular, “Though I’m not entirely sure what you are, I suppose.” She says, almost to herself.

“Am I supposed to know what that means?” He asks, and risks looking at her. She’s as beautiful as ever. She's flushed again. That’s odd, it’s only been four days since they last were. Then Stiles internally smacks himself. He doesn’t care about those things anymore.

And it’s creepy, to know that kind of thing. Really creepy. Never mind the fact that it’s fucking _weird_ that that happens to her at all. But he’s given up on that particular line of inquiries. Obviously. 

 _Yup. Veeeery convincing._ He thinks. 

“No. I suppose not.” She exhales harshly, frustrated. “Stiles, I’m trying to apologize for acting this way. I’m not asking for your forgiveness, I know you can’t grant it, but I do want to know that you understand. It’s not a good idea, for you and me to be friends.” 

Stiles barks out a laugh, harsh and uncharacteristic. 

“It’s understood alright. Comin’ in loud and clear, Lydia.” He says, his voice a little sharper than normal. 

“You don’t understand, there are things you can’t understand, but it’s not right for me to keep pulling you in.” He chances another look at her and she looks to be genuinely sad about it.

“I’m all sorts of confused right now.” Stiles says but he one-hundred-percent agrees with her. It’s not right. 

She chuckles despite herself and the situation, “That’s to be expected.” 

“You could at least try not to sound so damn cryptic.” He says. Lydia sighs, and looks up at him through her lashes. His breath leaves him in a rush and he has to focus hard on pulling it back in. He can’t look away, even though he wants to. 

He can’t even figure out _if_ he wants to. 

“It’s not a good idea for us to be involved in any way. It’s dangerous.” She says, her eyes pleading with him to understand, the bright, dazzling, _arresting_ green of them seeming to grow more intense, if such a thing is even possible. It’s dizzying, and his head swims before he shakes his head, trying to clear the cobwebs. 

Stiles scoffs, the sound a little forced if he’s honest and shakes his head at her, further clearing cobwebs and finding it easier than ever to look away from her eyes and look back at the board where Mr. Parker is currently lecturing. He couldn’t pay attention even if he wanted to, so he doesn’t feel too bad about ignoring him. “That’s interesting, Lydia.” He says with bite, “Last I knew, you stopped a car from killing me, so the way I see it it’s safer for you to like me.” 

“I don’t dislike you Stiles.” She says, her eyebrows furrowed. Adorably. Ugh. 

“Coulda fooled me.” He says, shrugging his shoulders, going for unaffected but most likely missing it by a league. 

She makes a frustrated sound. “Stiles just tell me you understand and I can leave you alone.” 

“No, Lydia, I won’t, because I don’t understand.” Stiles says, “I don’t understand what’s dangerous about you talking to me, I don’t understand anything _about_ you _._ ” He huffs. 

“What does that mean?” She asks carefully. He huffs a disbelieving laugh. 

“You don’t make sense, Lydia. You’re too fast, too strong, too perfect to actually exist and yet.” He gestures to her, “You get that normal people don’t do the things you do, right? Normal people’s eyes don’t change colours, normal people can’t stop a moving vehicle with their hand, normal people don’t do anything like you do.” 

Lydia blinks at him. 

“And I’m not going to tell anybody about you, about all of the weirdness. I’m not interested in exposing you and your family for whatever you are, and even if I was who the hell would _believe me_ ? _I_ don’t even believe me.  I just want to understand. But, if I remember correctly, I’m going to have to get used to unanswered questions.” That day in the hospital hallway feels like it was years ago now but he still remembers it with perfect clarity.  

Lydia looks gobsmacked. 

Stiles feels almost satisfied by that. 

“So unless you’re interested in answering any of those questions, I’m perfectly happy with you ignoring me again. You can’t ask me to understand without giving me anything _to_ understand and suddenly decide to pop back in with a smile and your stupid eyes like that’s perfectly normal. You can’t have both.” 

He looks down at his notes and does his best to catch up in the lecture. 

Lydia says frozen for the rest of the class. Stiles can’t decide if that’s what he wanted or not. 

When class ends he packs up his things and leaves the classroom before anyone else. 

When he gets to lunch he deliberately avoids looking over at the Argents’ table. He doesn’t care. 

“Dude, Lydia Argent is staring at you.” Scott says when Stiles sits down. Stiles doesn’t look at where he’s looking. He doesn’t care.

“I wonder why she’s sitting by herself today.” Kira says. Now Stiles can’t help but look. 

True to Kira’s word, Lydia is sitting alone at an empty table. She’s looking right at him and she offers a smile, dimples and all. Stiles sucks in a breath and starts scowling too late. _He doesn’t care._

“Weird.” He says uncharitably. 

“You should go sit with her.” Danny says and Stiles glares at him, “You think anyone else at this school would pass up that opportunity?” 

“Yeah, well, she can deal.” 

“Well you better be ready to tell her that yourself.” Danny says and Stiles looks up to see Lydia walking towards their table.  

“Stiles,” Lydia greets and employs the dimples, “Would you sit with me today?” The formal invitation mixed with the dimples and her eyes and that flush on her cheeks breaks down any defenses he had built up. He does care. _Well, we did try,_ he thinks. 

He sighs, defeated, “Sure.” He stands and grabs his stuff from the floor and follows her to the table.

He sits across from her, setting the lunch that he’s suddenly completely uninterested in eating on the table in front of him. Lydia’s side of the table is conspicuously empty. 

She sits primly opposite him, leaning forward and bracing her elbows on the table before snaking one hand around the back of her neck under her hair and leaning against it. The other crosses over to her other elbow and rests next to it. It’s a completely normal pose, a normal way to sit but she still manages to look like a model doing it.

Stiles can't look away from the flush in her cheeks and what he can see of her shoulder from where her sweater slid off or from the exhausting, hypnotic quality to her eyes. 

Not that he ever could. History class today was the first time and he knows self control is limited. His quota must be filled for the day and it irks him. 

Lydia doesn’t say anything, she just stares at his forehead, a crease between her perfect brows. Stiles sighs. 

“What do you want, Lydia?” Stiles asks after a few minutes of somewhat uncomfortable silence between them. 

Her eyes snap to his and he’s caught, just like he usually is. 

“I wanted us to talk.” 

“We talked this morning and you made your position quite clear.” Stiles points out and Lydia’s lips purse. 

“What I mean is that I wanted to find out what your questions are.” She says and smiles a little bit. Stiles narrows his eyes at her. 

“Are you going to answer any of them?” 

She grins, dimples on in full force and her eyes crinkling at the sides. “We’ll see.” 

Cryptic. Stiles sighs and knows he’s going to lose the battle with himself before he wages it but he can’t help but try, “I thought it was a bad idea for us to be friends.” He points out, hoping she either disagrees with herself or with him and that confuses the hell out of him. 

“Well I tried that.” She states flippantly, but her eyes are too intense, masking some kind of thought or emotion that Stiles can’t place. “Please? Just one?” She asks, her eyes pleading and her lips possibly pouting just a little bit _don’t look at her lips, don’t look, don’t look!_

He thinks about which one to ask first while trying to study Lydia without losing track of his train of thought or his senses. He keeps his eyes away from hers, knowing that if he even dares a glance he’s a goner. 

“Why do you stare at my forehead all the time?” He asks and he’s surprised when she bursts into musical laughter; flutes, clarinets, and strings swelling around her. 

“What an interesting place to start.” Lydia comments and Stiles narrows his eyes at her. This seems like a simple question, surely there’s a somewhat simple answer. She sighs. 

“You won’t believe me.” She says and the corners of her mouth twitch. 

Stiles fights the urge to smile back. “I might.” He grants her, knowing that whatever she says--no matter how bizarre--he’ll believe her. Because an answer, even a ridiculous one that can’t possibly be true, is probably better than the radio silence of the past six weeks. 

She studies him for a moment, her eyes flicking between each of his, and his forehead, “I have this ability…” She pauses, her lips pursing, “This _thing_ I do. I can…read people. I can usually do it with focus, usually with visual aid,” Her eyes flick up to his forehead again with a rueful half smile on her face, “But with you there's just… nothing.” She looks back up at his forehead and furrows her brows. 

“Why?” He finds himself asking. 

She chuckles, “I don't know. And I've been trying to figure it out, but I haven't the faintest.” A smile lingers on her perfect lips and Stiles’ eyes are drawn to them. 

“Huh.” Stiles says, thinking about it for a moment. That explains a lot of her confusion and frustration when he’d answered questions and they weren’t the answers she had been expecting, or how she seemed to know things she shouldn’t know. “Okay.” 

“Okay?” She asks, one eyebrow lifting. 

“Yeah.” Stiles shrugs. “Okay.” He says again and her eyebrows draw together in the very picture of confusion. It’s unbearably adorable. 

“I don’t understand.” 

Stiles chuckles, “I didn’t think it was that difficult of a concept.” 

“Stiles.” She chastises and stifles a grin. “I tell you I read minds and you’re… okay with that?” 

Stiles shrugs. “I have more information than I did before and that’s all I wanted. I don’t think you’re lying to me, because I don’t think your immediate explanation would be mind reading.” He sits back in his chair and shrugs again. “You don’t have anything to gain from that, and this way you’ve checked a question off my list. All your benefits lie in telling me the truth.” 

“A fascinating conclusion.” Lydia says, her eyes staring into his with unearthly intensity, like everything else about Lydia and Stiles is sure she means it. He shrugs, ignoring the flush he feels creeping up his neck. 

“Thanks, I guess.” He says, because how else is he supposed to respond?

“Do you have any other questions for me?” She asks, and her face is carefully neutral, probably hiding hope. Or fear. It’s not super clear which.

Stiles scoffs, “Only a thousand. Honestly, now that I’ve started I don’t know if I can stop.” A corner of her mouth lifts helplessly and something in Stiles’ chest flips. 

He clears his throat. “Why do you never eat lunch?” 

At this, her face closes off, draws the shutters, and hangs the ‘closed’ sign. 

“Next question.” She says, her voice colder than it had been before, her eyes hard. 

“Why?” Stiles asks, needing anything to go off of, any explanation for her behavior.  

“Because I can’t answer that one.” She says and Stiles purses his lips. On the one hand, he thinks it’s highly unlikely she _can’t_ and more that she simply won’t. And this is Lydia, so he knows that she doesn’t do anything without careful consideration. But on the other, he doesn’t want to stop the thing they have going right now, the openness--such as it is--that they’ve created. No need to mess up a good thing. 

“Fine.” He finally relents, “Can I ask a different one?” 

Lydia nods apprehensively. 

“Why are you sitting alone today?” He asks and she giggles. His breath catches in his chest at the sound. 

“So I could sit with you.” She explains. 

“And your siblings aren’t bothered by that?” Stiles asks. 

She tilts her head side to side, noncommittal, “Possibly. But even if they are, I wouldn’t care.” It could be flirtatious, could be casual and off the cuff, but with Lydia, whose literally hypnotic eyes are staring straight into his, occasionally flicking up to his forehead almost out of habit, there’s nothing casual about it. 

The jury’s still out on flirtatious, which is a statement Stiles still isn’t sure he can say but the facts are the facts. 

“Fair enough.” He says, mostly because he can’t think of a damn other thing to say. 

“What else?” She asks and it feels like she’s relaxing a little, even if only a fraction.

Stiles wracks his brain, searching for both a safe question--so she’s more likely to answer it--and a pressing one. The insignificant ones were pushed to the bottom of the list as he rifled through it all. 

But only one floats to the forefront, one that isn’t safe, not even remotely, but one he needs the answer to before this…whatever this is continues. 

“Why, if it’s so important to you, can’t you stay away from me?” Stiles asks. He almost doesn’t want to, to have her suddenly realize,  _huh, I guess you’re right Stiles whatever have I been doing, it’s time to leave you once again, it was nice this first real conversation out of three._

Lydia tenses up again and Stiles regrets asking. But he can’t deny wanting the answer. Her hand leaves the back of her neck and comes to rest on the table crossed over her other one. She slumps in. She almost looks…guilty. Which doesn’t make sense at all.  

“Because I can’t. Not anymore.” She says softly, so quietly he almost doesn’t hear her over the ambient noise of the rest of the cafeteria. 

“But what does that _mean_?” He pleads with her. 

“It means I’m an idiot, and selfish to boot. And you’re an idiot for sitting here with me.” She says fiercely, her voice never rising but scaring him nonetheless, possibly more than if she had. 

“Lydia, what does that mean?” Stiles asks again. The initial reaction he’d had to her, the aura of _danger_ some deep part of him had responded to, comes back to the surface as she turns her gaze on him. Her eyes look the exact same as they always do but there's something so _other_ about them in that moment, something so irrefutably _not right_ that it sends a chill down his spine. He can't even put his finger on what it is, whether the look is cold and cruel or hard and hungry. It's just… _wrong._

She shuts her eyes and Stiles tries not to inhale too sharply. She looks almost pained as she takes a breath. “I can’t stay away from you because I don’t want to. I’m too fascinated to pretend I’m not. I want to understand more than I want to keep you safe.” Lydia says and looks back up at him, looking incredibly guilty and almost pleading with him to understand, possibly to forgive her for being selfish, though he can’t even imagine how her being near him is unsafe. She had saved his life all those weeks ago.

“But why _me_?” He asks, “Why am I so goddamn ‘fascinating’?”

“I know nothing about you, Stiles Stilinski. Not one thing. And that’s not normal for me. I know everything about everyone as soon as I meet them but it’s just deafening silence from you.” She shrugs, a forced, tense action, as though she's trying to lighten the situation even though it doesn't feel all that heavy to him. “I have to know.” 

“So do I.” Stiles says. He reaches out and lays a hand on her arm. She inhales sharply and freezes, looking to all the world like a beautiful statue more suited to a museum than a high school cafeteria. Her arm is warm, unnaturally and blisteringly warm. It almost burns. “Jesus are you okay, you’re burning up?” 

She snatches her arm away from his hand, making it land with a smack on the table, placing her hands firmly in her lap under the table and out of Stiles’ reach. 

Now he has about a million more questions. 

“I’m fine, Stiles.” She mutters and Stiles _hates_ it. Maybe they weren’t making any headway but _God_ it was nice being able to talk to her. He doesn’t want that to go away. 

“Please don’t do that.” He says before he can stop himself, apparently not as above begging as he wishes he was, “Please don’t shut me out again. I can’t…” He takes a breath, “I can’t just sit here and never know.” He looks down at the table and waits to hear the sound of her chair scraping against the ground, of her grabbing her things and leaving him floundering for answers to questions he hadn’t even gotten the chance to ask. 

“Okay.” She whispers. “Okay.” 

Stiles looks up at her, shocked that she’s going to stay. 

“Do you have more questions?” She asks, her voice soft and undeniably nervous. 

“Do you?” Stiles asks. She snaps her eyes to his and furrows her brows. Stiles shrugs, hoping he looks noncommittal, “You said you were fascinated. Do you have questions for me?” He clarifies. 

“Yes.” She breathes, “Are you sure you’re willing to answer them?” She eyes him warily but he feels like pumping his fist in victory. 

“I’m an open book.” He insists. She laughs, the sound of it fucking _soaring_ through his chest. 

“Ironic choice of words, given the circumstances.” She notes, but she carefully sets her hands back on the table, eyeing him and silently asking him to leave them alone. He won’t touch her ever again if she doesn’t want him to. But he selfishly hopes that isn’t the case. He keeps his hands to himself. 

“How many am I allowed to ask?” She asks cautiously. 

“How many do you have?” Stiles asks incredulously. A grin spreads across her face. 

“Too many to answer in a lifetime.” She says, as though that particular admission means nothing to her, that everything else is hard, the questions about herself too much to divulge but the confession of her frankly staggering level of interest in him easy to reveal. 

“We could switch off?” Stiles offers. Lydia eyes him warily but seems to weigh her options. In the end, she nods. Stiles breathes a sigh of relief. A mutually beneficial agreement then. He waves her forward, giving her the floor first. 

“How do you like your coffee?” She asks immediately, as though she’d had it on the tip of her tongue. 

“Black, two sugars.” Stiles answers, “Can you hear everyone’s thoughts but mine?” She stiffens and purses her lips but seemingly remembers that they’re giving and taking here. 

“So far, yes. Who’s your favourite person to talk to?” 

“My friend Heather.” Stiles answers easily, “She lives in Beacon Hills, We’ve been best friends for as long as I can remember. Why do your eyes change colour?” 

She inhales sharply, “Next question.” Stiles narrows his eyes. 

“How do you like _your_ coffee?” He finally asks after consideration. She smirks. 

“That’s not very creative.” 

“You haven’t given me much choice.” He reminds her and she lifts her hands in a surrendering gesture. 

“Fair enough. I don’t like coffee.” She states, a glint in her eyes that makes him feel like he’s missing a joke, “If you started playing music right now, what song would play?” 

Stiles feels a flush rise immediately to his cheeks. “You don’t want to know.” 

“I assure you, I most certainly do.” Lydia says, her eyes flicking up to his forehead as though she’s reminding him. He sighs. 

“‘Bubblegum Bitch’ by Marina and the Diamonds.” Stiles admits, wincing. It feels oddly wrong to say the word 'bitch' in her presence but he moves forward from that easily.

“That’s not so bad.” Lydia says, “It’s just a pop song.” She shrugs. 

“I guess. I would’ve expected teasing from anyone else, honestly.”

“And not from me? Why ever not?” She asks, her brows knitting together. 

The bell rings, signaling the end of lunch and the start of their passing period. Stiles smiles, his whole being feeling lighter and warmer than it had mere hours ago.

"Maybe I'll tell you sometime." He says, both wanting to keep to himself the fact that he doesn't think Lydia would ever do anything to hurt him, physically or emotionally--because that's an insane notion as it is--and because he wants _desperately_ to do this again. He hopes that he can entice her, possibly, to sit and ask him as many questions about him as she wants.

Because as much as he feels like he's dying to know everything about her, talking to her like this, with a steady back and forth and interest on both sides, not to mention the almost-maybe-kinda flirting they have going on, is intoxicating. He knows without a doubt that he'll be drunk with it with minimal exposure. Probably already is. 

"I look forward to it." Lydia says and smiles, well more accurately, she _smirks_ with one corner of her mouth pulled up, one of her canines peeking from between her perfect lips as she watches him, her eyes tracking over his face. He feels the blood pooling up his neck and into his cheeks and the look in her eyes goes momentarily dark before it turns almost…frightened, of all things. She swallows and looks resolutely back up at his eyes. 

"I should get going." Stiles says, moving his fingers restlessly over the strap of his bag, meaning to go home and get some studying done, but he knows there's no way he won't be replaying the past forty minutes over and over in his head. 

"As should I." She says, but she doesn't make a move to stand up, collect her things and head to class. So Stiles takes the initiative to bow out while he's ahead, even though he definitely doesn't _feel_ like he's ahead. 

"Have a good rest of your day, Stiles." Lydia says as he turns to go, "I'll see you tomorrow." That smirk is back and Stiles does his best to ignore the frankly worrying pace of his heart. 

He makes a somewhat hasty retreat and sits in his jeep for a few too many minutes just revelling in talking to a girl he likes. And he doesn't even feel like he did a terrible job either. So he feels vindicated in placing today in the 'win' column. 

His afternoon passes much the same, with him hoarding the moments and spinning them this way and that under a loupe in his mind to analyze from all angles like a particularly zealous jewel thief. They all feel like stolen moments, where a girl that magnificent would take time out of her day to ask him question after question and seeming to need the answers as much as Stiles had wanted his own. 

He plays her laugh in his head like a CD player stuck on one particular part of the CD. 

He wonders if he actually likes her. The person she is, not just the staggeringly beautiful outside and the alluring intensity she attaches to everything she says and does, and not just the way she's fascinated by him. He's only human, that kind of attention would go to anyone's head, his included, and above all he wonders if, even if he does like her, does she like him?

Is he simply an unanswered question--or several--that she's hunting the answer for? Is he some passing amusement she'll be bored with moments after he answers her final question?

The insecurities creep in as he lays down for bed and he lets them spin through his head unhampered, because there's no way he could dispute them. He doesn't know what she wants. He's just along for the ride. 

After tossing and turning for a few hours he finally falls into a deep, exhausted sleep. 

_Hands grasp his, pale and thin but beautiful rather than ghastly. Sharp, pointed nails painted a deep red dig into the skin at the back of his hands. He looks up at the person holding him and sees her._

_It's not Lydia, not really. Her hair is a similar shade--though he can't be certain in the darkness of the forest--her lips almost the right shape and her face very nearly as lovely. But she's too sharp, too angular to actually be Lydia. This Lydia is terrifying._

_He tries to wrench his way from her grasp but she holds tight, leaving ugly red scratches where her nails dig in. He tries to tell her to let him go but his voice is gone, no matter how hard he tries to get the words past his lips._

_Then one hand blurs away from his, and he doesn't see it make its way to his neck but it lands there the moment it leaves his hand. The nails sink into the skin at the nape of his neck but it doesn't hurt. He leans his head back and lets her guide him backward, dipping down as though they were dancing._

_Her lips rest against his neck and she hums before swiping one long stripe from collarbone to ear, giggling at the taste._

_Then her teeth pierce his skin and he's more than willing to let her._

Stiles wakes with a start, covered in sweat and his breathing alarmingly steady even though his heart gallops against his ribs. 

_What?_


	8. Even They Feel the Cold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm early! And this one's a looooong one. You're welcome in advance and also thank you for being chill with my different formatting, my keyboard's still broken. Thank you so much for reading! I'd love to hear any thoughts you have if you have a moment to write a comment or two!
> 
> Enjoy this monster sized chapter! :)

The next day Stiles shakes off the vestiges of a nightmare he can’t even really remember. His neck itches the whole time he’s showering and he can’t shake the feeling that he should be remembering something, something important. 

But he shrugs it off, for lack of anything better to do, because it isn’t going to become clear while he’s thinking about it. 

He heads into school still feeling hopelessly discombobulated. He smiles at Kira as she waves to him excitedly--as if Kira does anything without excitement. 

“Hi, Stiles.” She says as he takes his seat next to her, delighted to see that her hair is up and her tattoo is out and about. 

“Hey.” He replies. 

“So the plan for tomorrow is to meet at my house and then carpool to the beach. Does that work for you?” Kira asks. 

Stiles nods, “Yeah that’s great, how long should it take us to get there?” He asks, then reaches up to itch the side of his neck. 

“It’s only about forty minutes.” She says, “Would you be willing to let us use your Jeep for cargo?” She asks as her eyes get drawn to his fingers on his neck, still absently itching. “Hey is your neck okay?” She halfway lifts a hand to vaguely point it out. 

He rips his hand away from his neck--perhaps a little too quickly--and shrugs, going for nonchalant. 

“Yeah, I just slept weird.” He tells her, which is true, at least to some degree. 

Kira’s eyes narrow slightly but she lets it go and continues telling him about their plans for the trip tomorrow, along with telling him he’ll have to get up way earlier than he’s ever wanted to on a Saturday morning but for Kira he can make an exception. 

“Hey, um, Kira,” Stiles haltingly starts and Kira turns kind eyes on him. He steels himself, “Could I invite someone on the trip?” 

“Of course!” Kira says, her face lighting up. Then she smiles slyly and says, “Tell Lydia she’s more than welcome.” 

Stiles feels the flush crawling up his neck and ignores it steadfastly. He refuses to sputter or make a fool of himself, so he just nods and endures the soft elbowing Kira delivers him. He even has a little smile for her in response, surprisingly undisturbed by the friendly teasing. 

He’s not even sure if he wants to invite Lydia, but if he does want to, he figures he should have the permission of the coordinator before actually asking. 

He also sincerely doubts that Lydia will even want to, but he’ll extend the offer nonetheless. 

The day drags as he makes his way impatiently to lunch, hoping that Lydia will be sitting alone again and that they’ll get to talk more. 

He’s decided to ask her questions he’d ask any other girl that he was interested in. How else is he supposed to get to know her? Yes, he still has about a million questions about _what_ she is, but _who_ she is might actually take precedence. Which is _shocking_ to say the least. 

But if he’s going to be interested in her, and he’s pretty sure he _is_ interested, then he should be interested in the person, not just the looks. 

Finally he’s allowed to dress down after gym and head to the cafeteria, eyes anxiously scanning the tables to see if she’s sitting on her own.

A grin spreads all the way across his face when he sees her flaming curls flowing down her back over a dark grey sweater as she sits facing away from the door, at an empty table. He barely manages to _walk_ there rather than sprint but he makes his way and sits across from her. 

She grins at him, her dimples on full, stunning display. _Fuck,_ he thinks as the full force of her hits him head on again. He hadn’t noticed before, but half of her hair is tied up as the rest hangs down in curls. Her sweater is high-necked and slouchy, somehow looking flattering rather than swallowing her figure whole. With light jeans and black Converse she should look casual and relaxed not like a fucking actress in a major motion picture. He’s starting to run out of comparisons for what she looks like, and even the ones he has aren’t accurate in the least.

Lydia is literally indescribable. 

“Hello Stiles.” She greets and Stiles sucks in a huge breath of air, making Lydia smile wider. 

“Hey.” He says breathlessly. He grins back at her, pretty much letting go of the fact that he’s about to make a fool of himself in front of this girl because, honestly, it seems like she’d still stick around afterwards. 

Which is _wild_ , and most likely the incorrect assumption, but then she grins again and Stiles throws insecurity to the back of his head for as long as he possibly can. 

“Do you have more questions for me?” She asks carefully and Stiles nods, his grin shrinking down to a smile that’s slightly more manageable in size. 

“Absolutely.” He states, laying his hands out in front of him on the able. Lydia mirrors him, placing her sweater-clad hands on the table, palms down. They inch slightly closer to Stiles’ but he doesn’t make a move to touch them. She smiles softly at him, looking up from under her lashes and the wind gets knocked out of him. 

“Then I suppose I’ll let you have the floor first.” She says, inclining her head. 

Stiles thinks for a moment, indecisive about where to start and needing a moment to get his bearings, his fingers tapping the table as he thinks.

“How was your day?” He finally asks, partially because it feels like a good opener, and because he genuinely wants to know. 

“Dreadfully dull. But it’s starting to look up.” She says. Stiles grins at her, his heart rate at already alarming speeds. “And yours?” She tacks on. 

“Long. Boring. Did I mention long? Truly, a snail would’ve begged for a gas pedal.” He says before he can think better of it and is rewarded when she laughs--full on, boisterous, _brilliant_ laughter with her eyes squeezing shut and shoulders shaking. 

He hadn’t thought it was that funny, but who is he to say anything at all in the face of that fucking _sensational_ sound. He isn’t normally one to tug ten-cent words out of his sub-conscious thesaurus, but here he’d needed one. 

“A spectacularly vivid image, Stiles, I applaud you.” Lydia says, her lips stretching into a smile that he’s only ever seen when he’s seemingly made her happy. He’s starting to think it might be a smile she only shows a few people. 

“Why thank you.” He says, taking a mock bow with the flourish of a hand, hampered as he is by his seat. He sets his hands back on the table, inching them just a tiny bit closer to hers. She doesn’t scoot hers back. 

“Your turn, I believe.” She prompts, something in her demeanor changing slightly, nerves creeping in after the humor had taken its leave. 

Stiles takes a deep breath in and asks, “What do you do when you’re bored?” 

Lydia blinks at him before curling in on herself and giggling. Stiles grins, basking in the sound of her laughter. He feels somewhat like an addict, poking and prodding in just the right way to get that high. He doesn’t know how much he cares, because it seems to make Lydia happy. And it certainly makes _him_ happy. No losers in that situation.  

“Is this a question regarding my existence or my personality?” She asks, her eyes still dancing and her smile twitching. It’s the first time she’s even remotely acknowledged that she’s not human. Because that’s not an option anymore, he’s not sure if it ever had been. And as bat-shit as the notion is, it’s as close to the truth as he’s come so far. He’d eliminated the impossible and whatever’s left over, as improbable as it is, must be the truth. Conan Doyle might’ve hated the character he’d created, but Stiles is more than willing to adopt that kind of mentality in the face of all the ‘impossible’ that’s going on in his life at the moment. And in any case, he’s willing to overlook her inhuman-ness in the interest of getting to know her. 

He’ll deal with the complications that will cause later. 

“Personality.” Stiles answers. 

She giggles again before answering, “I read. Occasionally I play music, which my mother adores.”

“What do you play?” He asks. 

“Not so fast,” Lydia says, “It’s my turn.” She smirks and Stiles feels himself turn to putty in her hands. 

He gestures for her to continue and she pounces, as though she’d had the question sitting on her tongue for days. 

“Which movie could you watch over and over again?” 

“ _Princess Bride_ , and I do watch it over and over again.” He tells her and she laughs. 

“On that particular score, I can agree with you.” 

Stiles grins. “What do you play?” He asks again, now that it’s his turn. 

“Piano, cello, violin, viola--though I only play viola because it bothers Isaac--the flute, guitar, ukulele.” She shrugs, “If it has strings I can usually pick it up pretty easily. Piano was slightly harder and I’m still not very good with the flute.” Lydia says then has the audacity to shrug like it’s no big deal that she just listed seven instruments and then made excuses about her skill level. 

“Lydia, you’re telling me you can play seven instruments with any level of expertise?” Stiles demands. Lydia smiles softly and tucks a piece of hair behind her ear as though she’s _shy_ and it about short-circuits every neural pathway in his brain with how fucking adorable it is. _Shit._

“Yes, I suppose I am.” 

“That is actually unbelievable. I’m _honestly_ having trouble believing you.” He shakes his head in what may or may not be awe. “Okay, your turn.” 

She ponders for a few seconds before asking, “Have you always been insatiably curious?” Lydia cocks her head, a few curls falling over her shoulder as she does. 

“Yes. Absolutely. My dad always says that my first word was ‘why’.” He tells her. 

“Fascinating. Was it actually?” Lydia asks and Stiles laughs. 

“Probably not. Probably more than likely ‘no’ or ‘dada’ based on my limited knowledge of babies’ language learning patterns.” 

Lydia giggles. “Do you know much about the language learning patterns of babies?” 

Stiles shrugs, “No more than I know anything about anything else, I guess.” Stiles shrugs again, “I just like knowing things.” He explains. He doesn’t even care that she’s gotten two extra questions. 

“Yes, that is one thing with which I am intimately familiar.” Lydia says with a smirk. And it’s a heartbreaking expression. Stiles is sure he could look at her smirking at him as long as he lived and never want to do anything else.

“Yeah. Sorry about that, by the way.” He says, bringing his hand up to rub nervously at the back of his neck. “I may have pushed you too much after the crash.” He admits and cringes as he looks back up at her. 

“Well _I’m_ not sorry. If you hadn’t pushed me, I’m entirely sure I never would have spoken to you again. I never would have been so fascinated with you.” Lydia says, again shamelessly admitting that she _wants_ to talk to him, likes it, even. 

To some degree he can understand it, the fascination that comes with being denied the information you want. It’s part of the reason he’s here now, sitting across from a girl who can’t be more than five feet tall and one-hundred-twenty pounds soaking wet but had somehow crushed the side of a truck with her tiny, bare hand. 

But on the other end of things, he couldn’t understand what was so damn fascinating about him, even if she couldn’t read his mind. Why would that have made him so compelling to her?

“I can see you thinking in there and I’ll have you know it is very frustrating.” Lydia says.

"Because you can’t hear what I’m thinking?” He guessed and she nodded, smiling a soft smile. He almost doesn’t tell her, wanting to keep some of his more insecure thoughts to himself. But in the end he knows he doesn’t want to deny her in this new realm of honesty and transparency between them. It’s not the whole truth, not always, but he no longer feels like she’s shutting him out simply because she can. He feels a little bit more like there has to be a reason for why she shut him out, mostly because he’s starting to get to know her more, and it's clear Lydia doesn't do anything without a reason.

“I’m just wondering what, beyond not being able to hear my thoughts, makes me so interesting.”

He doesn’t look up at her, fearing the worst, not even really knowing what the worst would be. 

“Well I will admit that a great deal of the intrigue comes from not being able to read your mind, but not in the way you think.” She explains, “What’s most interesting is that you aren’t predictable. H--people are predictable, to a fault usually. But you are not. Every time I ask you a question or attempt to thwart your nosiness--” She winks, telling him she doesn’t honestly mind all that much while also giving him a small heart attack, “--you respond in a completely incalculable way. I tell you I read minds and you simply accept and move on, you see something blatantly out of the ordinary and your first thought isn't to chase a headline.” She shakes her head in disbelief, “You are, without a doubt, the most absurd person I’ve ever met.” 

Stiles can’t even pretend he isn’t flushed from the chest up. For some reason, being told he’s absurd feels like the utmost compliment coming from her. And, simply by the virtue that she generally understands people instantly, what with the whole mind-reading _thing_ , it probably is. She's certainly smiling like it is. And he'll take that any day. 

“Uhm.” He says, ever the articulate one of the pair. 

She giggles, “You don’t have to have a brilliant answer to that. I understand it’s quite a thing to be told.” She says and Stiles laughs. 

“Just a bit.” 

“Do you have more questions?” She asks and Stiles nods, already opening his mouth to ask more. 

“What do you want to do with your life?” He asks. It’s fairly generic as far as getting-to-know-each-other questions go, but you could learn a lot about a person based on their answer beyond what their answer is.

“What do I want to be when I grow up?” She asks, a somewhat sardonic tilt to her mouth. 

Stiles shrugs, undeterred by her reaction. “If you wanna put it like that, sure. 

She places her chin in one of her hands, leaving the other on the table, still near his. She purses her lips for a moment, staring past him, almost scowling. He feels like he may have touched on a topic that she isn’t all that interested in discussing but it’s too late to take the question back, so he waits for her to answer. 

“I’d wanted to be a chemist. Any kind of chemist, I wasn’t picky.” She stares over his shoulder, “I wanted to make things, wanted to put my memory to use. It’s uncommonly good you know.” She looks over at him and offers him the smallest of smiles. He returns it. “Memorized the periodic table in only a handful of hours.”

“So, why not be a chemist, then?” Stiles asks, struggling to put the pieces together. 

She smiles ruefully, “Next question.” She says, her voice almost sad, like she wants to tell him but something’s stopping her. 

He clears his throat, “It’s your turn.” He says quietly. 

She looks up at him, her eyes impossibly sad, looking ages older than the teenage girl in front of him. “What do you miss the most about your mother?”

Stiles chest caves it. 

It isn’t that he’d forgotten, he’ll never be able to forget and he doesn’t want to, but it’s been a little while since he’s felt _so_ good, so much less like the unsaturated gray version of himself that he’d grown used to over the past months without her. But it all comes rushing in again, slams into him full force with no regard for the happy bubble he’d created for himself. His hands slide off the table and into his lap. 

“I’m not sure.” He tells her honestly, his voice sounding small and broken even to his own ears. “It’s all the little things. I miss that she would wink at me when I was late for school. I miss her singing. I miss the way she put the plates back in the cupboard. I try to do it, but it’s not the same.” He takes a deep breath, feeling the ache all the way to the marrow of his bones.

“I miss everything.” Stiles finishes, looking up at Lydia. Her eyes still hold that age-old sadness, and some sympathy but it’s mostly understanding. She gets it. 

“My mother made lemon bars.” Lydia says quietly, “She wasn’t one for the kitchen, paid other people to cook for her, clean for her, be a mother for her. But she made lemon bars. I still don’t know what her recipe was, though I’ve tried to recreate them an incalculable number of times. I don’t think I’ll ever learn what it was that made them different. She only made them on special occasions, once or twice a year if I was lucky, but she made them on my birthday, the last birthday I had with her.” She smiles at Stiles, a minute uptick of the corners of her lips, which trembled minutely. 

“I’m sorry.” Stiles says, “That you can’t make them like she did.” He reaches his hand out across the table, leaving it in the middle, palm up. The invitation clear, but its acceptance completely up to her. And he wouldn’t fault her for refusing.

She eyes his hand for what feels like hours, but must only have been seconds before she places her fingers in his palm, his fingers brushing against her palm. Her skin is as warm as it had been yesterday, almost uncomfortably hot. 

“Thank you.” She whispers. Stiles nods, knowing that there’s nothing either one could say right now to make the other feel better. But he can touch her hand and feel what she feels, and for right now that’s enough for him. 

They’re snapped from their reverie, jolted back to the present, the environment of the mundane cafeteria with students filing out to get to their next classes. Stiles inhales sharply and Lydia pulls her hand away from his, bending to grab her bag, gathering herself to go to class. 

“Wait.” Stiles says and reaches a hand out as he stands. He doesn’t grab her with it--because it’s clear that she doesn’t like touch when she can’t be the one instigating, which Stiles is more than willing to roll with--it’s only meant to be a stilling gesture. “What are you doing tomorrow?” He asks before he can lose his nerve. 

She raises an eyebrow at him, “Hadn’t decided yet.” She answers noncommittally. _Fair enough._

“We’re going to the beach tomorrow,” He says, his words almost running together, “I was--well I wanted--I mean you don’t have--”

“Stiles are you asking me if I want to go with you?” Lydia asks gently, a smile pulling at her lips and lightening the atmosphere around them significantly. 

“Uhm. Yes. Yeah, I’m asking if you want to go with me. Us.” He shuts his eyes minutely, just marinating in his mortification for the time being.

“Which beach?” She asks and Stiles does his best to make it seem like he’s somewhat unconcerned about whether or not she’s going to join them. 

“I don’t know the name of it,” He admits, “I just know we’re going with the Hales.” 

Her face closes off, goes carefully blank, “I’m not so sure I’d be welcome.” She says and the statement feels weighted, like there’s something significant to be gleaned from it. 

But fuck if he has any idea what it is. 

“Kira said you were, would’ve invited you herself if I hadn’t.” He tells her honestly. She gives him a slight uptick of her lips. 

“I don’t think it’s the best idea.” She says sadly. Her eyes are apologetic, like she’s genuinely sorry, possibly not even just for him, but for her too. Like maybe she wants to. He decides not to dance around it. He squares his shoulders and takes a breath.

“But would you want to? A different beach or different people?” He asks her. She smiles at him. 

“Maybe.” She says, but maybe it’s the way she says it, the way her eyes look when she looks up at him through her lashes. He thinks she’s saying yes. 

A grin shoots its way across his face and he barely manages to keep the giddy laugh in check. 

“Okay.” He says. 

“Alright.” She breathes. They stand there for a little while longer, staring at each other until a hand comes down on Lydia’s shoulder. 

It’s her brother--well, sort of--Isaac’s hand. 

“Lyd, come on, let’s go.” He says softly, smiles at Stiles as he pulls Lydia away.

“Bye Stiles.” Lydia says as she turns. 

“Bye.” Stiles breathes. The next bell rings and he’s late for Calc. He curses under his breath and hurries from the cafeteria. 

That night he cleans his house from the top down. Scrubs and mops and tidies like a mad man out of sheer jitteriness. 

He’d practically asked her out and she’d practically said _yes_. Lydia Argent, the single most gorgeous and magnetic person he’d ever met, wanted to go out with him. He hadn’t actually framed it as a date, really, but it doesn’t matter because there’s no way she misinterpreted what he was trying to say. She doesn’t need to read his mind to know what he was trying to ask. 

His father comes home and immediately knows something’s up, most likely smelling all the cleaning products. He sighs and Stiles sits up from where he’d been working at a stain on the kitchen floor. 

“Hey.” Stiles says, somewhat out of breath from the veracity of his cleaning. 

“Hello, Stiles.” His dad says and Stiles winces. His dad chuckles. “What’s goin’ on here?” He asks lightly. 

“Uhm.” Stiles says eloquently. 

“I see.” Noah says, smiling faintly. 

Stiles inhales sharply and stands, preparing himself for the conversation he’s about to willingly walk into. 

“So…you remember that girl I was telling you about?” Stiles asks. Even though it’s been a little over two months Stiles is sure his dad will still know which girl he’s talking about. 

“I do.” His dad confirms. 

“Well I, uh, kind of asked her out?” Stiles reaches a hand up and scrubs at the back of his head. 

“Wow. That’s big, kid.” His dad says, his eyes widening, and Stiles nods. “When’s the date?” 

Here Stiles runs into the snag. 

“Well, I didn’t actually--uhm--” He clears his throat, “--I kind of invited her to go to the beach with us tomorrow and she said she didn’t want to after I said the Hales were going, but then I asked her if it was a different beach or a different group would she want to go then and, well, technically she said ‘maybe’ but it was the way she said ‘maybe’--don’t look at me like that I know what I’m talking about.” Stiles scolds his dad. Noah chuckles. 

“I’m not looking at you in any type of way. I’m happy for you, definite yes or not. I mean, you thought this girl was out of your lead right?” Stiles shrugs and his dad rolls his eyes, “Well now you know that’s not a problem. She’s at least open to the idea.” Noah shrugs. “That’s big, kid.” He says again and Stiles nods. Then he surveys the house around him and snorts. 

“I went overboard, didn’t I?” Stiles asks, internally wincing. 

“Hey, I’m not gonna complain about a clean house. But, y’know, I think you missed a spot in the laundry room.” 

“What? I did? I thought I--” Stiles realizes his mistake as his dad places his hand in front of his mouth, ostensibly to itch the side of his face but really to hide the grin. It’s something he’s literally always done and Stiles always know he’s trying not to laugh when he does it. “Oh come on.” 

His dad laughs outright then claps a hand over Stiles’ shoulder, “I’m happy for you, Stiles.” 

Stiles flushes and brings a hand up to scrub at the back of his neck. “Thanks, dad.” 

His dad gives him a patented Dad Smile that Stiles hasn’t seen in a little while. It’s just a small uptick of lips, but it’s filled with emotion; pride, love, sadness--the nice kind, where you realize things have changed but it’s not entirely a bad thing--happiness. It all sits right there in one smile and Stiles is so glad to see it he swings his arms around his dad and hugs him for all he’s worth. 

And he hugs Stiles back. 

They have dinner together, but tonight it’s a little less quiet. Stiles talks about his trip to the beach tomorrow, a little bit about his friends. His dad chimes in when Stiles mentions Kira, asking Stiles to tell her that he really appreciates the cookies she’d passed off a week ago. He’s been savoring them, only eating one a day or less. Stiles snorts and tells him he will. He also makes a mental note to ask Kira for the recipe.

Stiles makes sure he has everything he needs for the beach before he goes to bed, completely unsure what those things actually are. Portable battery with cord for his phone is really the only thing he’s sure he’ll need. He also puts a hat in his bag with gloves because while it’s _supposed_ to be sunny, he’s not willing to gamble and freeze. He also packs a wind breaker for that same eventuality. He knows he’s not going swimming, so doesn’t even bother with a swimsuit. 

Getting to bed that night he still feels a whole hell of a lot of nervous energy and he tries to tell himself it’s because he’ll be hanging out with a bunch of new people tomorrow but he knows it’s not. 

He still hasn’t been able to shake off the dream from last night, and he can’t tell if he hated it or wants another one like it. 

He lays down for the night, opening up his phone to hopefully pull his mind from the feeling of nails digging into his skin. 

Eventually he can’t fight it anymore and drifts off. 

\---- 

He wakes with a start when his alarm blares and fumbles for his phone to turn it off. He sits up and rubs a sleepy hand down the side of his face, blinking away the sting of _too-fucking-early_ clinging to his eyes.

He pulls himself together with jeans and a hoodie, unwilling to try harder than that this early. It’s not even earlier than he has to wake up for school, but the fact that it’s _Saturday_ and he _could_ be sleeping in is the kicker. 

He pulls his backpack over his shoulder after scarfing down a bowl of cereal and makes his way out to his car with the early morning mist still clinging to the ground. 

He almost forgets the dream he’d had, pushed so far into the back of his head that he can’t remember the details. But he does remember flashes of heat, flecks of green, laughter. It hadn’t been bad, had been kind of nice actually, but Stiles can’t remember more than that. It slips away from him the moment he thinks he has a lock on it.

He pulls up to Kira’s house to see Danny’s car already in the driveway with a surfboard attached to the top. _Of course_. 

Scott pulls up moments after Stiles with two passengers Stiles thinks he kind of, sort of recognizes but can’t really put a finger on it. 

“Hey!” Scott calls like the excitable puppy he is and Stiles waves to him. “You look tired, you okay?” Scott asks and Stiles snorts. 

“Yeah I’m fine. Just don’t like getting up early on Saturdays.” He says, rolling his eyes, mostly at himself. 

“But it’s supposed to be sunny today!” Kira says, raising her arms in victory. Stiles chuckles and Kira grins at him. “I told you, didn’t I?” 

“Yes, yes you’re very wise.” Stiles teases, “Know-er of the weather and executor of the plans.” Stiles gives her a mock bow, “I bow to your superior expertise.” 

Kira lifts her nose and looks down it at him, “As you should.” She sniffs, but the corner of her mouth twitches, ruining the illusion. She punches his arm lightly and ushers him into the house to grab supplies to put into his and Danny’s cars. 

It takes a bit longer to pack up than Stiles would have thought, but he hasn’t been on a beach trip in so long he doesn’t have the best grasp on how long it should’ve taken. As it is, by the time they’re almost ready to go Danny has been not-so-subtly whining, which Stiles has called him out for more than once. 

It turns out that the people who were in Scott’s car were a girl named Sydney who Stiles is fairly sure he met once or twice during his time at Northridge but can’t actually recall and a guy named Brett, who had whined as much as Danny, if not more, and Stiles is fairly sure he always looks that superior. They’re apparently meeting his sister there, but Stiles doesn’t know who that is either. Starts with an ‘L’ or something. 

They finally depart, Stiles following Danny’s car because Danny actually knows where they’re going. Stiles has Brett, Sydney, and Scott while Kira went with Danny. 

The drive is nice, a little pretty, but the day is so far still over-cast. It takes about forty minutes to get to the beach itself and then about twenty minutes to cart all of their stuff down to a ring of logs around a charred bonfire. 

Other people start arriving by the time they’ve finished up, including Brett’s sister, whose name Stiles now knows is Lori. There’s also a guy named Ben; a girl named Jess; another girl, Holland; and another guy, Ian. All told, there are ten of them there. 

Ben, Ian, Brett, and Danny go track down pieces of driftwood and Stiles would offer to help but he doesn’t actually want to help and he’s sure he’d trip over absolutely nothing and land flat on his face if he’s not careful, and he generally isn’t. 

Kira enlists him to help her arrange the logs around the bonfire--though they look exactly the same once they’re done to him--and to get snacks going. She hands him a box of wine coolers and Stiles squawks. 

“Dude!” He accuses. 

“What?” She asks him, looking to all the world like she has no idea ‘what’. “Oh come on Stiles, it’s water, look in the box idiot.” 

Stiles flushes when she’s proven right once he checks in the box and he sticks his tongue out at her like the mature eighteen-year-old he is. She does it back, so really how immature was the act, really? 

He and Kira finally get the stuff set up like they want to and the boys come back with driftwood aplenty. They set it on top of the pyramid of charred wood in the center of a ring of rocks.

“We’re going surfing, anyone else coming?” Brett asks and Stiles raises an eyebrow at him, because the people sitting by the un-lit bonfire are huddled in coats and hats. Brett shrugs when he doesn’t get an answer and heads back to the cars, already pulling his hoodie over his head, taking his shirt with it. Stiles snorts at the behavior. Kira elbows him but smiles and rolls her eyes with him.

“We’re gonna go check out the tide pools, do you wanna go with us, Stiles?” Sydney asks him and Stiles shrugs. 

“Sure.” 

They hike over the rocky beach to where the tide pools are and look at all the animals living there and Stiles has to admit they’re cool. He sends some pictures of them to his dad and Heather. 

Heather sends back the fish emoji, to which Stiles responds with the octopus emoji, as is customary.  

The sun does make a brief appearance during the day, shining through the clouds enough that Stiles can peel his jacket off and lean back to enjoy it. It’s nice, being able to soak up sunlight like that. He’d missed it. 

The boys who went surfing are coming back in, dripping wet, to eat some sandwiches when the Hales show up. 

Stiles remembers most of their names, particularly Erica, Cora, and Malia and learns that the other boys with them are Jesse, Tyler, Boyd, and Sam. Another girl with them, Leah, winks at Stiles when his eyes bug out seeing her in shorts and a tee shirt in what is still barely more than fifty-five degrees.  

“How’s it goin’ _novo_?” She asks him and he blinks at her. 

“Uh, good?” He says and she laughs a deep, throaty laugh. 

“Good, good.” She says, sitting down next to him. “First time to First Beach?” 

Stiles nods, “Yeah, I just moved here, like, two months ago.” He tells her.

“Ah, truly brand new, then.” Leah says and Stiles shrugs. 

“Guess so.” 

She bumps his shoulder with a small smile. “Welcome.” She says and Stiles smiles back. 

They talk a little more, the weather, Kira, and the surfing idiots the most common topics between them. They’re joined by Sam--a very large, very intimidating guy with darker skin who also manages to have the kindest brown eyes Stiles has ever seen--and Malia, who immediately snuggles up next to Leah, and continue their small talk. 

“How do you like Washington?” Sam asks, a certain humor flickering behind his eyes. 

“It’s different.” Stiles admits, “Wet. Cold. Really fucking green.” Leah cackles and Stiles smiles at her. “I don’t know, just really different. But everyone’s nice.” 

“Well that’s ‘cause Kira got to you before anyone else did.” Cora says, turning from her conversation with Erica and Kira, “After Kira gets to you, everyone else has to follow behind in her display way-too-fucking-nice or they’ll be exposed for the assholes they really are. You got lucky, kid.” 

“Met anyone else you like?” Sam asks.

“Boy likes Argent.” Danny says as he walks past with his soaking surfboard covered in black sand. 

“Lydia Argent?” Leah asks and Stiles nods. Malia whistles. 

“Girl’s cute.” She says. Leah raises an eyebrow at her and Malia shrugs. “I see why you like her.” 

“I tried to invite her but she didn’t want to come.” Stiles says. 

“The Argents don’t really come here.” Sam says quietly and Malia smacks his arm. 

“I think it was sweet.” Kira says, “No one ever invites them to anything, I think it’s nice that Stiles tried.” 

“There’s a reason no one ever invites them to anything.” Jess says, “They’re _weird_. Like, certifiably strange.” 

“Like, they’re nice,” Holland adds, “But they’re kinda creepy.”

Kira looks scandalized, seeming to be shocked that anyone would speak ill of anyone else. “Woah, woah, woah, just because they’re different doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with them. How would you feel if you were them? All of them are foster kids who didn’t have anyone before Dr. and Mr. Argent who were kind enough to take them in, which can’t have been easy. And then they move around all the time because their guardian is a top surgeon, I mean how would you feel if every time you moved you had people talk about you behind your back, huh?” Kira seems to lose steam and the two girls look suitably chastised. “Just…just think before you speak guys.” 

Stiles decides then and there that he would move heaven and Earth for Kira Yukimura. 

After that Holland and Jess don’t have much to say. 

The day passes easily, and by the time the sun starts going down Stiles is well acquainted with everyone--including Brett, who really is that much of an asshole no matter what, but usually in a funny way rather than him being a straight up dick--and doesn’t mind that he had to wake up early and meet a ton of new people that he hadn’t previously been all that interested in meeting. 

Now they gather up the driftwood and work on getting it lit while the seats get reconfigured as people leave. Danny went home once he was done surfing, taking Ian and Ben with him. Malia and Leah went to walk along the shore at some point and hadn’t come back--Stiles _sincerely_ doubts they will--Brett, Lori, Jess, and Holland also left after surfing.  There’s only Erica, Cora, Jesse, Tyler, Boyd, Sydney, Ben, Sam, Scott, Stiles, and Kira left. 

Stiles ended up on Scott’s left with Kira on Scott’s other side on one log. That particular configuration had taken Stiles shooting Scott about eight-too-many significant looks until he had finally gotten it and sat between Stiles and Kira. Stiles had inwardly groaned. 

Across the fire from them are Erica on one end of the log followed by Sam and Boyd with Jesse on the other end. Next to them are Tyler and Sydney, who’s to the right of Kira and on Stiles’ left are Cora and Ben. 

Kira’s gearing up for s’mores when she says, “So, Erica…am I gonna get a ghost story?” Erica cackles. 

“Only if you ask nicely.” She purrs and Kira hands her a stick with three marshmallows on it. “Well, I guess that works too. One of these days, Yukimura, I’ll get you.” 

Stiles sends a questioning look to Scott who shrugs and mutters, “Erica wants to get in Kira’s pants, but Kira’s not interested in girls. Erica’s pretty sure she can get her to go for it anyways. There’s bets on and everything.” 

“And I will be collecting.” Cora says from Stiles left. 

“What did you wager?” He asks, unable to move on with his life without knowing. 

“Erica will get to third before Kira chickens.” Cora says and Erica scowls at her. Cora only lifts her chin in challenge.

“If I get all the way to third that girl will be ruined for anyone else.” Erica says completely unabashedly, spinning her marshmallows with intensity, seemingly trying to convince them and everyone else around the fire of her sexual prowess, which Stiles doesn’t doubt for a second. 

“I bet someone else gets to Kira before Erica.” Sam says and his gaze flicks over to Scott for the barest of moments but Stiles grins at him. Seemingly there are more people than just Stiles in Scott’s corner and Stiles is absolutely thrilled to know it.

“Okay, can we stop talking about my hypothetical sex life now?” Kira asks, but she doesn’t seem all that upset or surprised, so this conversation must be a common occurrence. 

“If you insist.” Erica says, sounding put upon. “So. A ghost story, huh?”

“If you please.” Kira says, leaning over and handing Erica graham crackers and chocolate. She winks at Erica, who mock-swoons. 

“Woman you’re killing me.” Erica groans, leaning against Sam for support. “But you did ask nicely. Which story would you like, sugar?” 

Kira laughs at the nickname. “You know which one I like.” She insists. 

“The one about the vampires?” 

“Exactly.” Kira says, grinning, excitement written all over her face. An inexplicable chill runs up Stiles spine. He pulls his jacket closer to himself.

“Long ago,” Erica starts, a grin curling the corners of her lips like the Cheshire cat, “In a town just like this, with people just like these, people went missing every couple of weeks; like clockwork. Just disappeared, not a trace to be seen--until they showed back up in a week, completely drained of blood.” The way her voice shifted, the sound of the fire and the way it mixed with her voice, the waves crashing against the shore; it all blended into a chilling atmosphere within seconds, worthy of any horror movie.

“There was one family who had moved into town within the last few years, though no one knows for sure how long they’d been there, or how long they stayed.” She continues, “Fairly normal, in a way; just like any other family really. But they were beautiful, _unnaturally_ so. Pale, sculpted, _vibrant_. Every part of them looked alive; an ever present flush covering their features, eyes so bright they were dazzling, teeth so straight and white how could anyone say there was anything wrong with them?” Erica pauses, looking at each of her audience members and smiling to see them utterly enthralled. 

“So naturally, no one made the connection. The missing people, the drained corpses. With a family so perfect, so dazzling, how could you even dare to say a word against them?

“It was then that the Hales started to change. Not the ones you see before you, no, this was generations ago.” Erica insists, “The Hales gained a natural enemy then, the creatures too beautiful to exist. They have many names, _moroi, Loogaroo, Jiangshi,_ Draugur, Revenant, Dhampir. But they call themselves…Vampires.” She grins, and something about it is so much sharper than before. “The Hales became protectors for the humans, shielded them from the creatures. It’s unknown, what changed them, what they became to save the humans.

“They trained, grew stronger, faster, better equipped to take on their enemies--”

“If you’re just gonna brag about how great your family is I’m gonna vote for someone else to tell a story.” Ben interrupts and Stiles laughs. Erica scowls at him and throws a handful of sand across the fire. Ben ducks, laughing along with everyone else. 

“As I was saying,” Erica says pointedly, “They trained, got better, hunted the less experienced ones. Things were even looking up. 

“Until the youngest one--the most alluring one--couldn’t control himself, couldn’t stand to keep up the charade anymore. He was newly created and insatiable, with a face so beautiful he could lure anyone he wanted away with a wink and a boyish grin. 

“A woman, too gullible, too naive to know better than to walk alone with a man like that, was there one moment and gone--” Erica snaps her fingers, the sound loud in the hushed air around her that almost crackles with tension, “--the next.” She pauses, the suspense closing in around them.

“She was found three days later, wandering aimlessly and mumbling about shining skin and glistening, gnashing teeth, delirious from blood loss and covered in teeth marks. They locked her in an asylum and happily threw away the key.

“The Hales took action, couldn’t afford to be discreet anymore, to keep the humans in the dark. They ambushed the Vampires on their own lands. The matriarch had surrendered, explained her son’s actions, done her best to dissuade the Hales from their witch hunt, to no avail.” Erica paused to blow a marshmallow out and eat the charred bit off it straight from the fire. 

“The Hales were unwilling to listen. Their people, their land, and the humans they protected were more important. They ripped them to shreds and burned the pieces to glittering ash.” Erica stops, constructs her s’more and takes a bite. The tension around the fire could be cut through with a knife. 

“But they missed a piece.” She finally says, staring straight into the fire, “It must’ve taken years to reform, to grow strong again, to become what it had once been. They say it hasn’t come back, hasn’t tried to exact its revenge.” Erica’s eyes look empty, blank. Haunted.  

"But I don’t think it ever left.” 

The chill that rips up Stiles spine goes so fast his eyes water. He looks away from the fire and tries to catch his breath. 

“Holy shit.” Sydney breathes and there’s breathless laughter around her, the tension beginning to dissipate. “You’re a great story teller. Jesus, I have chills all over my arms.” As if to illustrate her point, Sydney rubs her hands up and down her arms. 

“Thanks.” Erica says, the haunted look that had been in her eyes only seconds ago now completely gone. Stiles shudders. 

After s’mores they start to pack up their stuff, putting out the fire and hauling everything back up to the cars. 

Before they go, Stiles has to know what the hell Sam was talking about earlier, about the Argents not coming here. He still has chills running up and down his spine and he’s not sure it’s still because of the story. 

Right before they’re ready to head out, Stiles grabs Erica’s arm. 

“Hey can I ask you a question?” Stiles asks her and she grins. 

“Sure thing, sugar. Walk with me?” She asks him and he follows her back down to the beach, seemingly to grab something but he’s pretty sure they got everything. 

“What’s up?” She asks. 

“Earlier Sam had said…” Stiles trails off, his brows furrowing, “Sam said the Argents don’t really come here. What was that about?” 

Erica grins, folding her hands behind her back as she walks, her bare feet seemingly immune to both the cold and the sharp rocks. He struggles to keep up even though she seems to be walking at a leisurely pace. 

“You know the family in my story?” She says conspiratorially and Stiles’ brain kind of trips over itself at that. Is she saying that the family in the story is the Argents? But that can’t be true, she said it was generations ago. 

“No you can’t be saying that they’re the Argents, that doesn’t make any sense”  

Erica laughs. “Well, no, it’s just a story. But Mama Hale says they _were_ here all those years ago.” 

“What, like their ancestors?” Stiles asks. 

Erica grins, the corners of her lips pulling up slow like molasses. “No. They’re the _same ones._ ” 

Stiles’ heart must shoot directly into his throat because he has to gasp for breath. Erica laughs. 

“Nah, it’s just a story, but you’re a great audience.” She says, clapping his shoulder. “Come on, let’s get you home.” Stiles tries to shake himself enough to follow her. He only stumbles once or twice on their way back up by some miracle and she plants a kiss on his cheek before saying her goodbyes. 

They send the Hales on their way and Ben offers to drive Sydney home, leaving Kira, Scott, and Stiles driving back in Stiles’ Jeep. 

He drops them off at Kira’s house with a wave and as cheerful a goodbye as he can manage. 

Driving home he tries to ignore all the thoughts flying through his head, tries to drown them out with music, tries to think about anything else. 

But he knows it’s a lost cause no matter what. 

When he gets home he doesn’t bother unpacking anything, leaves it for the next day and heads inside, directly to his room. It’s late, and his dad is probably already asleep. 

When he gets upstairs he stares at his room. Nothing is different, nothing has changed but everything feels off. _He_ feels off. 

He peels off his layers and lays down on his bed on top of the covers, laying his hands over his chest. 

 _Pale, sculpted, vibrant._ Erica’s voice says in his head and he squeezes his eyes shut against it. 

 _Eyes so bright they were dazzling_ Erica’s voice says. Stiles chants, _Shut up, shut up, shut up_ back. 

 _Beautiful, unnaturally so._ She says.

_Every part of them looked alive._

A chorus starts in the back of his head, an ever present chant he can’t block out. 

_Drained of blood, drained of blood, drained of blood._

But the worst part, the one that feels like its tattooing itself into his psyche? 

_“What, like their ancestors?” Stiles asks._

_Erica grins, the corners of her lips pulling up slow like molasses. “No. They’re the_ **_same ones_ ** _.”_


	9. When the Morning Breaks Us

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one is super short but in an effort to upload by my own arbitrary deadline i'm gonna upload this one and then tomorrow i'll upload the next one. it's already done, i just can't edit it right now cuz it's 1 am. anyways! hope you guys like this chapter despite its length. trigger warning for panic attacks, if that sort of thing bothers you skip this one and i'll tell you what you missed at the end. stay safe kids!

When Stiles wakes up the next day, his head is pounding. He groans and rolls over, begging to go back to sleep. 

But his eyes snap open when he remembers. Remembers last night, the story, the conversation he had with Erica, everything. 

_The same ones._

He shakes his head, trying to clear Erica’s voice from his head. It doesn’t work, and he had known it wouldn’t, but he couldn’t help but try. 

 _Okay._ He says to himself. Okay. He’ll get up and do what he does best: work out what to do next. 

Because as fucking _batshit_ as this situation is, it does need to be dealt with. 

He sits up, kind of surprised that he doesn’t feel worse. He’s still wearing his jeans, and his shirt is plastered to his back with sweat. He peels it off with great exception and tosses it in the general direction of his laundry basket. Then he heads to the bathroom to shower and behave somewhat like a human. 

With that finished, he pulls a Beacon Hills Lacrosse hoodie on with a ratty pair of jeans and heads downstairs for a bowl of cereal, which he brings back upstairs and eats at his desk, staring into space and not tasting a single bite. 

First issue: Lydia and her family aren’t human. He had known that before now, had guessed it himself and then Lydia had pretty much confirmed it the other day. So now he has to figure out what she actually is. 

Second issue: he has no idea what he’s looking for. Even if he looks into…vampires…there’s no way to know what’s true and what’s not. 

Third issue: if he’s proven right, if it’s actually true, what then? Does he stop talking to her? Does he do the safe thing and pretend he never figured it out? Does he do what he should have done in the beginning and let this ridiculous obsession go? And even if he did, would he even be safe at the end of it all? Would his mere connection to the Argents put him in danger, put his dad in danger? What does he even _do_ if something happens? 

He can feel himself start to freak out and tries to wrench himself away from that aspect of his issues for now. He can’t let it go completely, but he also can’t focus on it right this moment. 

First things first: research, something he’s ridiculously good at. To deal with his second issue, he can take the details he’s seen in the Argents and compare it to what he finds online. It’s the only plan he has, so he guesses that’ll have to work. 

He pulls open his laptop and starts his search, putting on some music to at least attempt to make this whole situation less serious than it actually is. 

He feels stupid the second he types the word ‘vampire’ into the search bar, seeing link after link about roleplaying games, movies, TV shows, books. All fiction, he knows it. He pulls up the Wikipedia link for different vampire legends and reads through it a little bit, finding mostly legends that would give people a pass for doing shit they shouldn’t have been doing like adultery, that would make sure people respected their ancestors and dead relatives, or ones that were meant to scare kids into staying out of the woods. 

There’s very little of actual use, because for the most part, they don’t have any unifying qualities. They can’t even be relied upon to drink blood, at least not all of them. They aren’t even all _undead._ Without a solid basis he’s sort of fucked as to how to figure out if he’s right or not. Hell, he doesn’t even know if he _wants_ to be right. 

He pulls away from his desk and starts to pace. There are at least a few things he knows for sure: first, they have superhuman strength. Lydia stopped a car with the palm of her hand like it was nothing, hell, the metal _bent around her hand._ Second, they have superhuman speed. Lydia had been standing at the door and then she had been right next to him, making sure he didn’t get crushed by a truck. 

The rest is somewhat unclear. He knows their appearances change cyclically. It takes four days for it to change and then once it does they revert back to normal. And it’s not overt either, it’s subtle. The way Erica described it in her story was actually a great way to put it. It’s like they look entirely _too alive_ , not like they look dead. 

And they are ridiculously gorgeous, indescribably beautiful; literally without description. And that isn’t normal. Sure, there are pretty people out there, but _nothing_ like the Argents. Even the doctor is beautiful. They are without flaws, not a blemish, a wrinkle, a pore, or a hair out of place. It isn’t normal, that’s for damn sure. 

And even with that, the alluring quality of their beauty, there was that underlying danger that some primal part of Stiles can pick up way faster than the higher functioning part of him can. It’s base instinct. He can _feel_ how dangerous they all are. For a few of them it’s more obvious, like Isaac, Jackson, and the doctor. Allison and Lydia are less like that. But that doesn’t mean he hasn’t felt it from Lydia upon occasion, especially at the hospital or during their first meeting. 

Then there was the heat. She’s fever hot, something he’d noticed in the tiniest moments where they’d touched, especially when Stiles had touched her hands a few days ago. She’d been sweltering. So that isn’t normal. 

But all the stuff he’s found online doesn’t actually line up. Strength and speed, yes, but everything else? Maybe the beauty, that part could be confirmed with his research. 

But the cyclical changes, hot skin? Looking too alive? He can’t find anything even remotely matching that. 

Not that he would, if it’s true. If it’s true, there’s nothing to say that they would let the details of their lives, their weaknesses be open for public consumption. So, in essence, research won’t be much help.

He plops back down in his chair and stares at the open computer screen, still open to the Wikipedia page. 

Now he has to deal with the next couple of issues. If Lydia is a…a…vampire, what does he do then? God, what does he _do_? If he keeps up with this, if he’s right--and he’s pretty sure he is--does he back off? Does he leave this whole thing alone and go back to living his life? 

Could he even go back, knowing what he knows? No, there’s no way he could. He wouldn’t be able to let it go, it would eat him alive, knowing that there’s more out there than humans. There’s so much, so much to be understood and studied and known that he knows now that he can’t let it go.  

But now that he’s in it, does he just live with this knowledge and move on? Does he just accept, leave Lydia and her family to their lives and back away. It would hurt to do that, he knows it would, but he has more to worry about than himself. 

But, God, it doesn’t change anything, does it? His dad is still out there, still doing his job and working in the line of fire from humans, let alone what else goes bump in the night. It just means that he _knows about it,_ it doesn’t change the fact that he can’t do anything about it. These--these _things_ that exist are just out there, and have been for God knows how long. And Stiles is literally powerless to do anything about it. 

Stiles blinks. There’s nothing he can do. There is not a goddamn thing, in this world, that Stiles could do to change the danger that exists. And, in reality, how does that change the level of danger? It’s a different kind of danger, yes, but the volume doesn’t change. If they’ve always been around, if there’s always been this threat, then why would it go up simply because Stiles knows about it? It doesn’t change the fact that he hates that his dad is in danger like that, and that he has no idea the kind of dangers he faces, but the fact of the matter is that his dad could die at any point, he’s a cop, and it could be from anything, a gunman, a robbery gone south, a shootout, a fucking _vampire._ Anything at all. 

It doesn’t change the way Stiles feels about that, he sure as shit isn’t okay with the fact that his dad risks his life like that, but he also can’t stop him from doing so. His dad helps people, it’s what makes him happy. It’s what gives his life meaning. And Stiles would be selfish in taking that from him. 

And it’s not like he could even get his dad to give it up, like what does he even say? _Hey dad, I know you love your job and everything but vampires are straight up real and also incredibly dangerous and you don’t have a hope of defending yourself against them so can you just quit?_ Yeah, that’s not going to happen. His dad wouldn’t believe him without proof. And seeing as how he doesn’t _have_ any proof--not even to prove it to himself--there’s nothing he can do. 

 _God_ , there’s nothing he can do.

He’s so unbelievably powerless in this situation. And that all too familiar sensation terrifies him. 

Suddenly he’s in a hospital room, seeing his mom hooked up to machine after machine, tubes and wires that were supposed to keep her alive, but didn’t. And he’s standing in the doorway, looking at her, watching the heart monitor flatline and he’s never felt so powerless. Never felt so completely without help, or know-how, or chances. He’s sixteen and he’s never felt so goddamn alone, in that sterile room that smells like antibacterial soap and chemicals and feels just as cold as he does. 

Before Stiles knows it he’s panicking. His heart is racing in his chest, his windpipe cutting off, his hands shaking uncontrollably. He wraps his arms around his chest, holds his heart in and holds himself together against the hole that’s ripped open all over again. Tears stream down his face as shaking sobs escape and there’s nothing he can do about it. 

He just keeps seeing that room, and seeing his mom looking so damn small in that bed and he can’t. Fucking. _Breathe._ Can’t think past the buzzing wall of panic in his head. 

He tries, he really does, tries to get his breathing under control, tries to ground himself in reality, where he is right now. Tries so damn hard to fight it. 

But it’s no use. 

He slides off his chair and curls up with his back against his bed, the side of it digging into his back and he presses against it. His thoughts are swirling and focusing on that one moment, on the way everything had slipped through his fingers in an instant and left him alone. Alone and powerless and incapable of doing anything. 

He hears something distantly, but it’s muffled, like it’s coming in through water, like he’s drowning and can’t see or hear anything around him. Another wave of panic sweeps through him and he whimpers. He knows he’s rocking back and forth, knows his back will probably have a bruise on it from his bed but he can’t do a damn thing to stop it. Someone’s calling his name but he can’t hear them, can’t see them. 

His legs are numb, his fingers are tingling, he can’t fucking _see_ and he’s alone, so alone. Always alone. 

He feels hands around his upper arms, tight and shaking him. His name gets louder and he just wants it to shut up, just wants it to stop, wants everything to stop. He just wants _to_ **_s t o p_** _._

“Stiles!” Cuts through the dull ringing in his ears and Stiles looks up, his vision hazy and unfocused. He sees a face, knows it’s familiar, knows it should bring him comfort, but it doesn’t. 

“Stiles, you gotta breathe, buddy.” The voice says and Stiles heaves in a breath but it doesn’t help. He tries again, and again, heaving in breath after breath but it doesn’t _do anything_ and he’s still alone. 

“Stiles follow me.” It says and Stiles’ shaking hand gets put against something warm, something solid, something that’s got a pounding beat behind it. It moves under his hand, expands and pulls back in. It’s a chest, it’s breathing, and it told Stiles to follow it. 

It takes him several tries, several minutes of him trying to wrangle his breathing back into something resembling normal only for it to get worse again, for his breath to speed back up and forget the rhythm. 

But the rhythm under his hand doesn’t go away, it stays steady, stays concrete and Stiles clings to it. His fingers dig into it and he tries again, makes his chest expand the same way, pull back in as he exhales, then expand again as he inhales. 

His thoughts slow down, his vision clears a little, his legs tingle with renewed sensation. In through his nose, out through his mouth, slow and steady like the chest under his hand. 

He looks up and sees his dad there, looking worried and more than a little scared. 

Of course his dad is there, how could he ever think he was alone? He’s never been alone, he’ll never be alone. 

“Hey.” Stiles croaks, his voice weak and breathy. 

“Hey kiddo.” His dad says, offering him a weak smile. It’s comforting, even if it’s small. 

“Sorry.” Stiles says, leaning his head back against his bed, utterly exhausted. His limbs feel heavy and his hands are still shaking a little. 

“Don’t you ever apologize for this, Stiles.” His dad says firmly and Stiles’ eyes slide over to him. Noah’s face is stern and still really worried. 

“Okay.” Stiles says, not because he thinks he won’t ever apologize again, because he still feels sorry, but because he’s too tired to try and tell his dad differently. 

“What happened?” Noah asks and Stiles exhales in a gust. 

“I just…freaked out.” Stiles says and he knows that his dad doesn’t believe him for a second, but he can’t tell him the actual reason he had a panic attack. He had been researching vampires and then couldn’t stop thinking about how fucking _screwed_ he was and how out of his depth his dad would be and just snapped. What a stupid reason to panic. All he’d been doing was research.

“Whatever it was, it was a big deal. You don’t have to tell me, Stiles, but you don’t have to be ashamed either.” His dad says, like he knows inherently that Stiles is berating himself. Stiles doesn’t know if he can believe his dad, if he can just accept his weird reasons for freaking out. It doesn’t matter right now and Stiles is way too tired to try and rework his own mental distortions. It’s just too much work. 

“Okay.” Stiles says weakly. 

“What do you need?” His dad asks, getting that particular tidbit from Stiles’ school counselor who’d helped Stiles get his panic attacks under control after his mom died. It takes the pressure off, makes it about the person rather than the asker, makes them evaluate themselves and assess the damage. 

So Stiles does. 

“Water?” Stiles finally asks. He still feels jittery and off, like his skin is both too tight and too loose for him to comfortably exist in. 

“Can do. Can you stand up?” His dad asks and Stiles nods, hoping he’s actually right about that. His dad helps him up and Stiles leans on him while they make the trek downstairs. 

After that Stiles drifts. He dutifully drinks his glass of water and then again when his dad refills it. He eats the crackers he’s handed and doesn’t taste any of them. 

He sits on the couch with his dad, watches movies with him, lets himself just…exist for a while. It’s not all that hard. 

He doesn’t really think about vampires or mythology or danger for a while. He just doesn’t care right now. 

When he finally goes up to bed he lays there for a while, his thoughts finally gaining some traction again.

He doesn’t know what’s coming next, doesn’t know where this particular set of circumstances will lead. But he knows he has to just adapt. Roll with whatever happens because there’s nothing else for him to do. 

And he knows he won’t move away from this path. He’s not a coward. He won’t run from what comes now, whatever that may be, he _knows_ he won’t. He has to do what he can to keep his dad safe, and the best way to do that is with information and preparation. 

Decision made, he folds completely into sleep, the day having completely exhausted him. He doesn’t even bother to turn off his light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in essence, stiles does research on vampires, finds an astounding lack of information, and manages to work himself up into a panic attack over the fact that he has no power in the situation. discussions of claudia's death (i'm so sorry, i don't like it either) and the hypothetical idea of Papa Stilinski dying. No characters were harmed in the making of this chapter (except stiles but i promise he'll be ok)


	10. Where Only the Sweetest Words Remain

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my favourite thing about aus is being able to completely ignore canon to indulge myself and it is almost never more apparent than in this chapter. 
> 
> as promised, the next chapter to make up for the teeny tiny size of the last one. brief mentions of attempted murder here that is canon-typical, but i still feel like i should warn you

The sun filters through his room, leaving a square of light on his floor and brightening the whole thing up. Stiles opens his eyes and smiles at the light, even now loving the light more than wanting to sleep. He glances over at the clock and sees it’s six in the morning and he doesn’t even care all that much. 

He gets dressed and ready for school with plenty of time on his hands. He glances over at his computer and shuts it, the screen long since already asleep, but as it clicks closed it feels like punctuation. The final note. The turning of the page and moving on to the next part of the story where the characters accept that which they can or can’t change and move on to their adventure. 

He pulls a book from his shelf without really looking at which one it is before heading downstairs to make breakfast. 

He eats while he reads--turns out he’d picked up his battered up copy of _Inkheart_ \--and feels oddly calm. His dad heads off to work after a quick check-in, assuring that Stiles is, in fact, fine and telling the truth about being fine. 

He heads to school, moving through the day with ease, the sun streaming in through the windows and the attitudes from everyone around him lifted along with the constant cloud cover. 

Lydia isn’t in his history class. And he should be more bothered by that, he knows he should, but he’s figured it out. The curiosity is gone but the attraction isn’t. It’s like the edge on it, the one that was brought about by obsession and investigation, just smooths out. He still likes her, still wants to be around her, still wants to go on a date, but it’s almost normal. 

He’s just a guy who likes a girl. Kind of. 

And it actually confirms his suspicions, to have them gone on a sunny day. He’d been pretty sure that the sun does something to them, and now he knows it’s true, even if he’s not entirely sure what it does. Research conflicts.  

He heads home and does his homework, then some laundry while he reads _Inkheart_ some more, now that he’s completely sucked into the story. 

He watches another movie with his dad once he gets home and then heads to bed. 

He dreams, for the first time in a few nights. 

_He’s in the forest again, but it’s less threatening, now that he knows what lurks in it. He sees her again, that flash of red and black, the smile that looks far too wicked to fit on his Lydia’s face. It softens some, the minute he has the thought._

_“You figured it out?” She asks and Stiles nods. She smiles at him and he grins back, feeling light and airy._

_“So, what does that mean for us?” Lydia asks and Stiles is prepared to offer her anything at all._

_“What do you want it to mean?” He finds himself asking._

_“I don’t want to let you go, Stiles.” She tells him, and his chest feels tight._

_“You don’t?”_

_“No.” She says and something in her face changes, “Not when I have you so close.”_

_Suddenly he’s thrown back with Lydia advancing on him. He should run, should want to run, but he doesn’t. Then she has him in her arms and he doesn’t know what’s going to happen next when she dips her head…_

He wakes up, feeling almost forcibly pulled out of his dream by his blaring alarm. He fumbles to shut it off and even tries to go back to sleep but the dream is gone. Nothing left for him to go back to. 

The sun is out again today and as nice as that is, he’s a little disappointed. He’d kind of been hoping for Lydia to be back at school. 

His day is slow and boring, but Scott and Danny invite him to go to the next town over where there are actual shops that afternoon to help them pick out their prom boutonnieres. Stiles is almost shocked he hadn’t even realised prom was so close but in all honesty he was a little preoccupied. And there was really only one person he actually wants to go with and she doesn’t really seem like the school dance type. He agrees to go with them and after school they follow him back to his house so he can drop off his car and then they head out. 

It only takes about an hour to get there and that time is filled up with passionate conversation regarding any number of things, mostly things they disagree on. Stiles discovers that he loves to argue with Danny and that Danny most likely loves to argue with him. Scott tries to mediate as best he can, but it only works so well. 

“Wait, who are you guys going to prom with?” Stiles finally asks. 

“No one in particular, we’re just doing a group thing. You’re invited, if you want to go, but Kira said you probably wouldn’t.” Scott shrugs and Stiles is oddly touched. Yeah, he doesn’t really want to go to, but he hadn’t known Kira would be able to pick up on that. 

“Yeah, I don’t really wanna go. But thanks for offering.” Stiles says and Scott smiles and shrugs. 

“But I’m making sure Scott dances with Kira.” Danny says and Stiles can’t help the cheer. 

“No! No, she doesn’t even like me, it’ll make it weird!” Scott objects and Stiles laughs. 

“Dude, she does like you.” Stiles says. 

“No there’s no way, because if she did then…” Scott trails off. 

“Then why haven’t you asked her out?” Danny guesses and laughs when Scott turns red. “Because you’re an idiot. But it’s not too late, you’ll just have to dance with her and totally blow her away with Scott-brand-charm.” He reaches over and squeezes Scott’s shoulder. 

“I don’t know how to be charming!” Scott almost squeaks. Stiles suppresses the urge to giggle. 

“You’re already charming.” Stiles says, “You don’t have to try.” He rolls his eyes and Scott scowls at him. 

“This feels like something I should try for.” He points out. Stiles shrugs. 

“Maybe.” He admits, “But ultimately, you shouldn’t try to be someone you’re not. Kira likes _you_ dude, not whatever version of you you’d make to be better or whatever you’d try to do. Don’t worry about it.” 

“I can’t not worry about it.” Scott says and Stiles snorts. Fair enough. 

“Alright, I get that.” Stiles says as they pull into a parking garage. “But don’t worry so much that you fuck it all up. You’re great the way you are, don’t try to change that.” Stiles claps Scott on the shoulder once they're out of the car and Scott’s ears look a little pink. 

“Yeah, yeah, very heartwarming, can we go?” Danny says, already heading in the direction of the street, “I’ve got things to buy.” Stiles snorts and rolls his eyes at his friend. Scott shrugs and trails after. 

By the time they get through the third store Stiles is bored. Danny needed about six things too many, in Stiles’ opinion, and he’s ready to move on to dinner. The sun has started to go down, so Stiles makes his escape, heading to the bookstore to browse around while he waits for Danny and Scott to finish up. They said they’d meet him at the restaurant. 

Once he leaves the bookstore with a new book tucked into his jacket pocket the sun has completely gone down and he can’t remember which direction he'd come from. He turns right and makes his way towards where he thinks the restaurant should be. And if he gets lost he can always map it on his phone. He won’t be stranded. 

He keeps walking and makes it to what looks like a warehouse district. So pretty aggressively not where he’s trying to go. _Great._ Stiles thinks and pulls out his phone and starts typing in the restaurant’s name when he hears voices behind him. 

He turns, even though he knows he shouldn’t, in fact, he can feel his own instincts telling him to walk briskly in the other direction, but he’s never been very good at listening to them. 

A group of people are standing behind him, heads bent together, voices hushed. It’s shady as hell, that much Stiles can tell just by getting a cursory glance. He spins and walks in the exact other direction, feeling eyes on him like a physical touch. The hairs are raised on the back of his neck and he picks up the pace. 

“…he saw?” He hears a snippet of conversation behind him and _oh god they saw me._

“…can’t take chances…” Another one of them says and Stiles hears the sound of a gun cocking. 

 _Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck._ A litany starts in his head and he starts to run, knowing a moving target is harder to hit and that he needs to get as far away from this place as he physically can. He turns a corner into an alleyway and keeps going that way, hearing running footsteps behind him. _Shit, shit, shit, I’m gonna die, fuckfuckfuck._

He comes back out onto a main street and keeps running, trying to be unpredictable but it doesn’t matter, they’re right on his tail _fuck._

Then he hears the squealing of tires right behind him and he stumbles out of the way, landing on his hands and scraping up his palms. He looks over his shoulder and sees a very suspiciously familiar car, one he knows he’s seen before, hell, probably even taken note of it before. But he can’t place it. 

It slams to a stop in front of Stiles’ pursuers and someone steps out, flaming red hair flecked with gold in the streetlight. _Thank God_ . Stiles thinks, not even pausing on the questions spinning through his head mainly consisting of _how is she here_ and **_why_ ** _is she here_ and watches as the people behind him--two men and a woman--back up hesitantly in the face of Lydia Argent on the warpath. 

Stiles is glad he’s on the other side of her, hoping to never be on the receiving end of whatever look she’s currently giving to the people who were planning to kill him. 

“Lydia!” He calls when it seems like she’s going to keep following them until she can pick them off one by one. 

Her head snaps around to face him and it’s not Lydia, not the one he knows from history or from sitting at a lunch table, this Lydia looks like the one in his dream. Sharp, cruel, deadly; her eyes are cold, blank in a way he’s never seen. Her face seems to take on different aspects, almost, like it changes shape even though he knows it hasn’t, and it looks far more feline than it was before. 

“Lydia, please.” He pleads, not entirely knowing what he’s pleading for. He scrambles up to his feet and stares at her imploringly. “Please, I want to go.” Stiles tries again. Some of the preternatural stillness bleeds out of her and transforms into rage. 

“Get in the car.” She growls, her fists clenched tight. Stiles hurries to comply, throwing himself into the car and buckling his seatbelt. 

“Lydia.” He calls, his hands shaking, waiting for her to do something, anything. If he gets her into the car, he can keep her from killing them, at least for a while. But he knows she wants to end them here and now and there’s very few things that could stop her. Stiles is taking a gamble in thinking one of those things is him. 

She doesn’t turn, but her shoulders tense and her head tilts to the side, like she hears him but it’s not registering. 

“Lydia, get in the car.” Stiles demands, putting as much conviction into the statement as he can. She growls, a sound entirely too animal to have come from her and he shudders. 

“Stiles.” She bites out and Stiles can tell he’s making progress. 

“Lydia I want to go.” He tries again and she snarls before stalking back to the car unnaturally fast and throws herself into it, shutting the door and gunning the engine, peeling out of the parking lot they’d found themselves in. The steering wheel creaks under her hands. 

“What did you do to them?” Stiles finally asks quietly, the silence stretching with tension finally pushing him to ask her. 

“Not nearly enough.” She snarls, malice dripping from every word. This Lydia is new to him, but in a way he’s glad. Not to have almost died--yeah, no, he’d like to never experience that again--but because the more she shows him the more he knows he’s right. 

Lydia Argent is a vampire. 

And he just needs her to admit to it. 

“Are you gonna go back and hurt them?” Stiles demands. Her silence is telling. “Don’t you dare.” 

“You don’t tell me what to do, Stiles.” Lydia spits at him and Stiles grits his teeth. 

“No, but I can’t let you do that.” He says and her eyes land on his as she darts her gaze over and he holds her stare. “Because I’d know. I’d know that you did it.” 

She glares at him and for a moment he’s sure she’s going to put the car into park and leave him, on to kill the people they left behind. 

But then she narrows her eyes at him and returns her eyes to the road with a curse. Stiles exhales a breath he hadn’t realised he was holding. 

“Fine.” She grits out and speeds back into town. “Distract me.” She almost shouts and Stiles fumbles for a topic, any topic. 

“I’m happy to see you.” He blurts. 

She laughs derisively, a tilt to it that Stiles recognizes as self deprecating. “Yes, I’m sure being thoroughly terrified really adds to an evening.” 

“I’m not scared of you.” He says, knowing the truth of it the moment he says it. She doesn’t look over at him. 

“Find a better distraction.” She mutters. 

“You’re wearing a skirt.” He says, finally noticing that she looks like she’s dressed for summer with a short floral skirt and a loose, thin-looking dark red tee shirt that’s cut at the waist. 

“I wear skirts all the time.” Lydia says, her voice still harsher than he’s used to, “What’s so special about this skirt?” 

“It’s just--you don’t--it’s cold out.” He finishes lamely. “But, well, I guess you don’t get cold.” He says, meaning for it to be to himself but she wheels on him.

“Excuse me?” She hisses. 

“You don’t get cold.” He says again, committing. 

“And what makes you say that?” She asks, bitingly sarcastic. 

“You don’t ever wear your jacket even if you have one and you normally don’t; you’re clothes are always super thin and you don’t ever even _shiver_.” Stiles explains, “You don’t get cold.” 

“A theory of yours?” Lydia snaps and Stiles is oddly calm in the face of her anger, knowing it isn’t even remotely him she’s mad at. He’s the only one keeping her from grievously injuring three people, and he’s prepared to take a little bit of snapping because of that. 

“It’s a fact, Lydia.” Stiles says. She snorts. 

“Oh really?” Lydia rolls her eyes over to him and raises a perfect eyebrow, “And what other _facts_ do you think you have compiled?” 

Stiles shuts his eyes and takes a deep breath. It feels stupid, so unbelievably stupid, the theory he has. It doesn’t matter how much evidence he has to support it, doesn’t matter how right he thinks he is. 

If he’s wrong…well he doesn’t even want to _think_ about what would happen if he’s wrong. 

“You’re not human.” He says. “And I think I know what you are.” The words seem to hit her like physical blows, once for ‘human’, once for ‘what you are’.

Just then his phone starts buzzing in his pocket and he’s pulled back into the real world when he sees Scott’s name on the screen. He remembers his friends, the people he came here with, the reason he’s even here, along with the rest of reality like the fact that they are apparently going sixty-five in a forty. He’ll pick his battles on that one and let Lydia have her speed. 

He’s grateful once again for Lydia being there to save his life because Stiles can’t even imagine the kind of guilt Scott and Danny would feel. 

“Hey, Scott.” Stiles says, unable to control the slight tremor in his voice. 

“Stiles? You okay?” Scott immediately picks up on his nerves. 

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I just ran into Lydia.” Stiles says, knowing that Scott will completely accept this as a cause for nerves. He darts a look over at her, seeing a statue rather than a girl sitting next to him, not even so much as blinking. 

“Lydia?” Scott asks, not even trying to disguise the shock in his voice. Stiles scoffs despite himself and the atmosphere of the car. 

“Yes, Lydia. She’s gonna get dinner with me, if that’s alright with you guys.” Stiles says, knowing that his friends have his back and knowing that he needs more time with Lydia to keep her from going back. He feels a little bad for manipulating them, but with the knowledge that three people will be severely injured if he doesn’t, he finds it a little easier to stomach. 

“Holy shit, dude, no, go to dinner with Lydia. I mean, fuck us, man, go after it.” Scott implores and Stiles can’t help but snort. 

“Thanks man.” Stiles says. 

“Literally anytime.” Scott says and before he hangs up, Stiles can hear him telling Danny, “Dude Stiles has a date with Lydia and you and me are not better than that.” And then the whooshing sound of a disconnected call sounds in his ear. 

Lydia chuckles next to him and Stiles starts, looking over at her. 

“You have interesting friends.” She tells him noncommittally. 

“Thanks. I know.” Stiles replies. The silence hangs between them while Lydia seems unwilling to address Stiles’ words, either before his call or during it. He doesn’t mind waiting her out, as long as she’s here in the car with him.

“Don’t think I don’t understand what you’re doing.” She says, her voice cold in a way he hasn’t heard before but he doesn’t mind. He’s reasonably sure she’s only momentarily frustrated with him, not murderous, so he’s not all that worried. Maybe he should be, but he’s not. He knows Lydia won’t hurt him. 

Stiles shrugs, unrepentant. She scoffs, shaking her head in disbelief. 

He almost chuckles. “Do you want me to apologize?” He asks. 

Lydia glances over at him, her eyes searching his face for answers he’s more than willing to give her if she asks for them. But not before. 

“No. I want you to get out of my car.” She snaps, but she doesn’t slow down, or pull into a parking lot, or even stop at the side of the road to let him out. They both know he wouldn’t go if she did. 

“I thought I told you to distract me.” Lydia points out. Stiles tries to hide the grin spreading across his face but he knows he does a terrible job of it. 

“Do you want to get dinner?” He asks, surprising her, but he’s only keeping his word to Scott. He’d said Lydia was going to dinner with him, might as well take the opportunity to actually follow through. He’s just staying honest with his friends, and if he happens to also go on a date with a girl he really likes, well he won’t say no to that. 

“Stiles.” Lydia chastises and Stiles rolls his eyes. 

“I mean it.” 

Lydia sighs. “Fine. Let’s go get dinner.” The answer is less than enthusiastic, but Stiles is relatively undeterred. The car slows noticeably and she turns around. 

They end up at the restaurant that Stiles had been trying to find, and he would put up a protest about the locale since his friends are supposed to be here, but he can’t help the jittery excitement crawling up his spine and it’s doing a lot of the thinking for him. 

Restaurant choice fully leaves his realm of awareness as Lydia gracefully pulls herself out of the car. Her legs are uncovered in a rare show of skin, smooth and shapely, accentuated by the shortness of her skirt and the boots she’s wearing. Stiles probably should be used to her being perfect in literally every way, but he’s not quite there yet. 

They walk into the restaurant together and Stiles asks for a table for two when it’s clear Lydia’s not up for talking just yet. The hostess’s eyes are wide as she scrambles to grab menus and seat them, her eyes raking up Lydia’s form. Stiles smiles at her, understanding fundamentally the mind-numbing image Lydia paints. The hostess leads them to a table and her gaze cuts to him for a moment with her eyes still wide and her lips parted slightly. Stiles smiles, ignoring the shock on her face, no doubt brought on by this goddess’s choice of company. 

She rattles off the specials and lets them know that their server will be with them shortly before tripping away. 

Stiles chuckles. 

“What’s so funny?” Lydia huffs.

Stiles shrugs. “Your beauty transcends sexualities, apparently.” 

“How do you know she was straight?” Lydia asks, an eyebrow raised. Stiles shrugs. 

“She didn’t even try to hide how she was ogling you. Girls who like girls are _much_ better at covertly checking out other girls. Survival instincts.” Stiles explains. Lydia narrows her eyes at him but the corner of her mouth twitches. 

“Fine.” She acquiesces. “So.” She drums her fingertips on the table’s surface, “I’m not human?” Her voice drops, but it’s clear that she can’t let it go until they’re done with dinner. 

“Nope.” Stiles says, popping the ‘p’ and looking up as their server shows up, a kid barely older than him who doesn’t even so much as look at Stiles. 

“Hey, I’m Mike, I’ll be taking care of you tonight. Can I get you anything to drink?” He recites, his voice sounding a little more cardboard than Stiles thinks it normally does. Lydia gestures to Stiles and he asks for a Coke. Their server nods, looking puzzled, and leaves them to grab Stiles his Coke.

“And what makes you say that?” Lydia asks carefully, her eyes narrowed, picking up as though they hadn’t been interrupted. 

“Honestly, it’s a lot of things. Mainly a scary story I heard.” He shrugs, as though his heart isn’t pounding its way out of his chest, like it’s the most normal things in the world, to debate the humanity of the girl he’s currently sitting opposite. 

“A scary story?” Lydia asks incredulously. 

“Yeah. Turns out Erica Hale is really good at scary stories.” He says. 

“It’s Reyes.” Lydia says. 

“Erica Reyes, then. You’re avoiding the topic.” Stiles points out and Lydia huffs. 

“And just what am I, then?” Lydia sniffs, crossing her arms. Stiles smiles. She doesn’t realise the fact that he can read her like a goddamn book and everything about her reads ‘nervous’. 

“You know, the word itself is really ridiculous said in this kind of context.” Stiles says, the beginnings of apprehension taking hold even though he tries to push it away. 

“Spit it out Stiles.” She says and she kind of gives Stiles the impression of a child stomping her feet. 

Mike swoops by and sets down two Cokes even though they’d only asked for one. He asks if they’re ready to order and Stiles orders fettuccine without even looking at the menu. He hands Mike the menus without looking away from Lydia, who’s quietly seething across from him. Mike turns to her and Lydia glares up at him, telling him she’s fine. He doesn’t stick around after that. 

Stiles decides to stop torturing her. 

“Vampire.” He drops, his voice oddly monotone despite the word having some ridiculous, indefinable weight between them. Lydia straightens completely, her hands landing on the booth beside her. Stiles can hear the vinyl seat creaking beneath her no doubt tightly clenched fingers. 

“And your proof?” She asks quietly, dangerously, her voice barely more than a murmur. 

Stiles shrugs. “Name an interaction we’ve had, a conversation, the crash, hell, even you disappearing for weeks afterwards. Lydia, you haven’t exactly been subtle.” 

She squeezes her eyes shut. “Now is really not the time to test me.” She mutters and Stiles feels a chill snake up his spine. 

Admittedly, he’d assumed that after it all being out in the open things would get better, without all the secrets between them. She’d seemed like she liked him, that she wanted to spend time with him. Was it all a lie to see what he knew? To see what it would take to keep him quiet? 

He doesn’t want to believe that. And he desperately hopes it’s not the case. 

“Sorry.” He says softly. Lydia sighs. 

“I’m sorry, Stiles. Just…give me a moment.” She requests and Stiles does. He sips his Coke while she sits there with her eyes shut, sitting still as a statue. Mike brings him his fettuccine and Stiles thanks him and waves him off when he asks if Lydia’s sure she doesn’t want anything. 

Stiles takes his first couple of bites before Lydia finally speaks. 

“Thank you.” She says finally. 

“Sure.” He responds. 

“I’m sure you have questions.” She says, resigned. Her shoulders hunch in but she lifts her head to give him a half-smile. He beams back at her. It’s as good as blanket permission and he takes it like it is. 

“I have so many.” Stiles admits and rubs a hand over the back of his head, his leg bouncing under the table in place of _him_ bouncing his way out of his seat. Not exactly first date behavior. 

 _Holy shit he’s on a date._  

“May I request you save them for the drive home?” She asks and Stiles nods, easily agreeing to her terms with the promise of actual _answers_ , answers he’d been sure just a few days ago he wasn’t going to get. 

“And in the meantime?” Stiles asks. 

“I think it’s only fair I get to ask a few questions of my own?” She appeals and Stiles shrugs. 

“Ask away.” 

She takes a deep breath and Stiles is reminded of the conversations they’d had just days ago. 

“How did you draw this conclusion?” She asks. 

“Like I said, a scary story. When we went to the beach, Erica told us a story about a family of vampires. The elements lined up in a way they hadn’t before. Before, I’d had, like, pieces of the truth and no cohesive idea, no place to actually put any of it. It was the way she talked about them, the things she said, specifically. ‘Vibrance’ and ‘unnatural beauty’ just clicked.” Stiles answers, watching her closely for her reactions. Her hands haven’t left the seat. 

“And before then, what had you noticed?” Lydia studies him, her eyes flicking over his face. 

“Your eyes.” He admits, “There is absolutely nothing natural about your eyes.” She scoffs despite herself and Stiles grins. 

“And there was the whole car crash thing. And that you tried to tell me I was crazy.”  

Lydia cringes. “I’m sorry, that was uncalled for on my part.” She tells him, “I didn’t know how to dissuade you from that line of inquiry, and in the past I’ve known exactly how to throw someone off the scent, so to speak.” Her eyes go to his forehead and she looks almost forlorn about it, but she smiles. “Naturally I didn’t have that advantage with you.” 

“It’s okay. I get it now.” Stiles says, shrugging. 

Lydia shakes her head in disbelief. “Your capacity for forgiveness and adaptation is astounding at times, Stiles, did you know that?” 

Stiles laughs. “I’ve never had it said like that before but I have been called tenacious.” He says. Lydia chuckles. 

“It’s a complete mystery as to why.” She says and Stiles’ shoulders relax. _This_ he can deal with, the bantering-bordering-on-flirting that they’ve had going on for the past couple of days. Not only can he deal with it, he knows it means that they’re on a more even footing, that they’re starting to actually understand each other. The feeling is electrifying, for lack of a better word, and Stiles is basically _high_ off of it. 

“Anything else?” Stiles asks. Lydia sighs. 

“On the topic of my…existence, yes, but nothing that can’t wait. On the topic of _you_ , absolutely.” She says and Stiles makes a ‘go ahead’ motion. 

“To whom is the last person you said ‘I love you’?” She asks, catching him completely off guard. 

“My dad.” Stiles replies, recovering admirably in his opinion. “Or Heather. One of those two.” 

“Are they so interchangeable?” Lydia’s head tips to the side. 

Stiles chuckles. “No, but they are the only two people I say I love you to.” Lydia nods. 

“Tell me about Heather.” 

Stiles grins. “She’s ridiculous. And an asshole on the best day and a nightmare on the worst. She’s sarcastic and witty and impossibly smart, too smart for her own good. We’ve been friends for as long as I can remember. She was here, for a week over spring break.” 

“Was that the girl I saw with you at the diner?” Lydia asks and Stiles is honestly shocked she noticed. 

“Yeah, blond girl.” 

Lydia giggles. “Jackson thoroughly enjoyed hearing the thoughts she had about him. They were quite creative.” 

“Jackson can read minds too?” Stiles can’t help but ask. 

“No, but I imparted the knowledge. Ordinarily I try to avoid giving him a bigger head than he already has, but I felt this was a particular set of circumstances.” She grins. 

Stiles’ eyes widen. “Oh my God, what did she say? Wait, is that an invasion of privacy? No, it doesn’t matter, she’d tell me either way, tell me.” Lydia giggles at the circular argument he’d just had with himself. 

“I believe the phrase ‘I could compose smutty sonnets about his jawline. I don’t even know how to write a sonnet, but I would learn for this’ was used.” 

“You believe, huh?” Stiles says, noting the fact that the statement was absolutely something Heather would say, word for word. 

“If I remember correctly.” She evades and Stiles laughs. 

“That doesn’t surprise me at all.” He says. 

“Another interesting friend.” Lydia says and he shrugs. 

"I attract them.” 

“So you do.” Lydia replies. 

Stiles just stares at her, a probably super dopey smile on his face but he just can’t help it. Not only is she gorgeous, she’s funny, and smart, and she likes his friends, and she likes _him_ , and not just because she can’t read his mind. He wants to lay all his cards on the table between them, tell her how he feels, tell her that he wants to be with her, but he’s terrified. If he gets rejected, if she’s not similarly interested, he’s not sure what he’ll do. 

So he doesn’t say anything, at least not yet. 

"What about your father?” She asks and Stiles smiles a completely different smile, one that belongs completely to his dad.

“He’s good, unbelievably good. Fairy-tale-level-good.” He says, “He cares, a lot, about people. Anyone and everyone, even and especially people he doesn’t know. He always wants to do what’s best for everyone, wants to make sure that everyone has the best. And he’s funny, so funny, it was what made my mom fall for him in the first place.” 

“A sense of humor will get you everywhere, or so they say.” Lydia says and Stiles laughs. 

“Yeah, it worked for him at any rate.” He steers clear of asking her if it works for him as well, because he’s not quite sure he’s ready for the answer, whatever it is. “He’s practical, too, logical and observant to my constant disadvantage.” 

“I’m sure.” She says. Stiles scowls at her with absolutely no heat. 

“And he’s full of love. All kinds of it, not just for me or for my mom, he just has so much of it to give away and he does it so subtly, too. I think he’d happily adopt every single one of my friends.” 

Lydia giggles and Stiles grins. 

“He sounds like a lovely man.” 

“He is.” Stiles says, nodding. 

"Are you finished?” She asks him and he blinks at her before remembering he was meant to be eating. He looks down at his plate to see it completely empty and he has no idea when that happened, but here he is. 

“Yup.” He says and catches Mike’s eye when he can and asks for the check. Mike tries to ask again if he can get Lydia anything and she flashes him a dazzling smile, dimples and all, and tells him no thank you. He actually sways on his feet for a moment before stumbling away. Stiles raises an eyebrow at Lydia, who looks innocently at him from under her lashes. His heart stutters in his chest, but he ignores it. 

“That was mean.” He chastises and she giggles. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She replies. Stiles snorts. Once Mike brings the check by, Stiles reaches for his wallet but Lydia has her card placed in the folder and handed back to Mike before Stiles can even pull his wallet out of his pocket. Stiles shoots her a look and she shrugs. 

As soon as they have Lydia’s card back they head out, back into Lydia’s car and on their way to Stiles’ house. 

He shoots Scott a text saying Lydia’s gonna drive him home and gets a string of emojis from him that Stiles doesn’t need a dictionary to translate. He snorts. 

“What?” Lydia asks, looking over at his phone. 

“Nothing. Scott has delusions about how my night is going.” Stiles says and doesn’t miss her smirk. 

“And how is your night going, Stiles?” She asks coyly. 

“Stupendous.” Stiles replies. Lydia laughs. 

“Positively marvelous?” She asks and Stiles laughs. 

“Just sensational.” 

“Well I’m glad I didn’t disappoint.” Lydia says and her eyes dart back over to the road with a smile curling her lips, but her posture is slightly tense. She seems _shy_ if Stiles isn’t mistaken. 

“You never could.” He says before he can stop himself. Well, it’s out there now, no taking it back. 

“Stiles.” She whispers and the sound runs right over his nerves. 

“Yeah.” He says. He wouldn’t take it back, not even if he could. It’s only three words, but it feels like an admission all on its own and it makes him feel stripped bare in a way he thinks he probably shouldn’t. 

“You had questions?” Lydia says after a beat of silence, her voice somewhat tight. It’s not rejection, per se, but it doesn’t feel good. 

“Yeah, uhm.” Stiles clears his throat. “Okay. So, vampires.” 

“That’s not really a question.” Lydia says quietly. 

“But it is.” Stiles insists and Lydia’s eyes shut. 

“Yes. Vampires.” She says and Stiles inhales. 

“Okay. Good to know. Anything else?” He asks. 

“Yes, but those aren’t my stories to tell.” Lydia says. The confirmation is enough though. 

“Fair enough.” 

“Stiles.” Lydia prods gently. 

“Right, yeah. Well, I guess I just want confirmation on the stuff I think I already have figured out.” 

“Alright.” 

Stiles takes a breath. “So you have speed, strength, and agility?”

“Yes.” 

“And your looks?” 

“Stiles, what are you asking me?” 

“Are your looks part of the package? Like, when you get turned you get more attractive?” Stiles asks, searching her face. 

“Well, yes and no. When we’re turned, it only enhances what we already have. Augment a quality one already has in abundance. For me, it made my hair orange. It was originally more blonde.” 

“And your eyes?” Stiles asks. 

“They were green.” She says, her lips curling into a small smile. “Not quite _this_ green, but green nonetheless.” 

“So the colour stays the same when you change?” 

“Yes and no.” Lydia says and Stiles gets the feeling he has to ask the right questions to get the answers he wants. He thinks for a moment before asking another one. 

“And the changes? The color of your eyes, the flush? You look…more vibrant some days than others.” He says and he feels embarrassed basically confessing that he’d been paying that close of attention. She inhales sharply. Apparently he’d found the question she hadn’t wanted him to ask. 

“You’ve yet to ask the most important one.” She insists and Stiles knows the one she wants him to ask but he almost doesn’t want to. He knows the answer, can’t help but know it. But if he asks, and finds out that the girl next to him has… 

He doesn’t want to know. 

But it’s what she is. And he has to _understand_ what that is, even the parts of it that he doesn’t like. 

He takes a deep breath. 

“What do you eat?” His voice comes out flat, the words slightly rushed. He hadn’t been sure he’d be able to get them all out. 

“Stiles--”

“No. Tell me the truth Lydia, I need to know.” 

“No, you don’t.” She says sadly, “You don’t need to know. When you find out you’ll--”

“I’ll what? Come to my senses? Realise the danger I’m in? News flash, Lydia, I’m in the same amount of danger whether or not you tell me. So you might as well.” Stiles says, waving his hand in a general ‘get on with it’ gesture. There’s a beat of silence before she says anything.

“Blood, Stiles. I drink blood.” Lydia states. “There, are you happy?” 

Stiles doesn’t know what he is. He’s not scared, that much he knows. Maybe a little grossed out, but that’s mostly because he’s squeamish. 

“And how do you do that?” Stiles asks, his voice impassive. 

“Blood bags. My mother helps with that part.” Lydia says. She chances a glance at Stiles but he doesn’t shy away from her. He’s relieved, in all honesty. The girl he’s steadily falling for isn’t a murderer which is a plus. 

“Okay, I have a weird question then.” Stiles says, ignoring his own assertion that he’s falling for Lydia because _one thing at a time, dammit._

“I would expect nothing less.” Lydia offers him a tentative smile and Stiles returns it. 

“Do different blood types taste different?” He asks and Lydia laughs. 

“I will never understand you.” She says, shaking her head almost fondly. “Yes, but only slightly. Some of us have preferences, but generally not.” 

“Weird. Does it taste good?” Stiles can’t help but ask. Lydia scoffs. 

“I cannot believe you. I tell you I drink blood, confirm that I’m straight out of a penny dreadful, and you want to know if blood ‘tastes good’?” She looks over at him, her face screwed up in confusion and disbelief. 

“What? What did you want me to do, Lydia?” Stiles asks. 

“I don’t know! Run screaming into the night?” She insists. Stiles can’t help it, he wishes he could but he can’t. 

He laughs. 

“Don’t laugh! This is serious!” Lydia exclaims but she starts giggling anyways. 

“I mean…I could give it…my best shot.” Stiles says through peals of laughter. Lydia laughs, and it’s just as fantastic as it always is, especially in the confines of the car. It’s like a more potent version of what he’s always heard, without the din of the cafeteria behind around them, with just the two of them here. It’s even more addicting now. 

“You’d probably trip over something.” She says and Stiles shrugs. 

“I mean I can’t see in the dark.” He says and Lydia grins conspiratorially. He gasps, his eyes widening. “Holy _shit_ , you can _see in the dark_?!” She laughs at his reaction and nods. 

“That’s the coolest thing I’ve ever heard. How far?” He asks. Lydia rolls his eyes at him. 

“If I had to guess, a couple of miles at least. It’s better in daylight, of course, but that’s my estimate.” She says and Stiles shakes his head in disbelief. 

“Holy shit.” He says again, for lack of anything better to say. He starts to recognize scenery around them and he groans. 

“What?” Lydia asks.

“We’re almost to my house.” He sulks, “And I still have, like, a thousand questions for you.” 

“Would you like me to pick you up for school tomorrow?” She asks, her tone a touch formal and Stiles scoffs at her. 

“Yes, yes I would.” He says, his tone of voice matching hers as they pull up to his house. The porch light is left on and his dad’s cruiser is in the driveway. 

“Then I’ll be here.” She promises.

Stiles pivots in his seat to face her, leaning against the door. “Can I ask you one more question?” 

“I suppose.” Lydia allows. 

He takes a deep breath before asking. “Lydia, do you…do I…” He huffs, “Do I _appeal_ to you, I guess.” He finally asks, placing emphasis to hopefully convey what he means and braces himself for the answer. 

She studies him for a moment, her eyes flicking all over his face and trailing down his body in a way that makes him shiver despite the clinical look on her face. 

Then she leans forward until her face is inches from his own. Stiles’ breath gets caught in his throat and his heart feels like it might beat straight out of his chest. 

Lydia places the very tips of her fingers over his pounding heart and leans even closer. 

Her lips press against cheeks and he’s frozen in place. He wants to turn enough so his lips can meet hers, wants to tangle his fingers in her hair, wants to bite at her full bottom lip. He wants to _kiss her_ but she hasn’t given him any indication that she wants that. This isn’t a kiss, not really, it’s testing the kissing waters and Stiles won’t fuck that up. This is _way_ too important to try and rush now. 

She moves her lips to his ear and he can feel her breath against his neck, her grin against his cheek. 

“Yes.” She whispers to him and it sends goosebumps all the way down his left side. 

Stiles doesn’t have to ask to know what she means. He’d wanted to know if she wanted to…well if she wanted to drain him dry, but if she did, she already would have. 

He _appeals_ to her, in a completely human way. _Oh holy_ **_fuck_ **. The thought alone sends a shudder straight down his spine and back up again. 

Stiles lets out a sigh, intending for something witty and flirtatious to come out but he’s got nothing, absolutely nothing in light of recent developments. Lydia giggles and leans back. 

Her eyes search his with a sly smile curving lips that he can’t tear his gaze away from and her fingers trail part of the way down his chest before she removes them and leans all the way back into her seat. 

“Goodnight Stiles.” She says and he fumbles for the door handle behind him. He clears his throat. 

“Uhm--yeah--you.” He clears his throat again and starts over, “Goodnight to you too.” His voice still comes out breathy and quiet but it was a full, coherent sentence and that is a fucking _feat_ in the face of what just happened to him and he will _take it._

He manages not to fall out of her car and shut the door with some modicum of control. He also somehow makes it up the porch steps and into the house. 

Stiles stands in front of the door, just staring at it until his dad clears his throat. 

“Stiles.” 

Stiles jumps, spinning around and falling against the door in a show of extreme grace on his part. 

“Yeah?” He asks, his voice still too high pitched to be normal. He tries clearing his throat again. 

His dad chuckles. “What happened?” 

“I, uh, well.” Stiles swallows. “I ran into Lydia and we went to dinner.” He brushes past all of the events leading up to that. 

His dad raises his eyebrows and looks at him, considering, “Really?” There’s a note of pride in his voice and Stiles grins. 

“Yeah.” He says, giddy. 

“I take it it went well?” 

“She, uh, kinda kissed me? Well not kissed me, kissed me, she kinda kissed my cheek--”

“Stiles,” His dad interrupts him before he can gain too much steam, which he’s grateful for, “That’s great.” He says and Stiles knows he means it. 

“Yeah.” Stiles says, coming dangerously close to swooning. He shakes his head, trying to clear it. His dad laughs. 

“I’m glad you had a good time.” He says and Stiles beams at him. 

“Me too.” Stiles says truthfully. And he _did_ have a good time, barring the near-death-experience. 

“When are you seeing her again?” His dad asks and Stiles stands up, moving away from the door and feeling his head clear up a little. 

“She’s gonna pick me up for school tomorrow.” He says and his dad nods. 

“Good.” 

“Yeah.” Stiles clears his throat. “Well, I’m gonna, just.” He points up the stairs and his dad chuckles and waves him off. 

Stiles stumbles his way up the steps and into his room. 

He gets ready for bed like usual, trying to collect his thoughts in the shower for longer than he normally does but he can’t really be blamed. 

He crawls into bed and has just long enough to have no idea how he’s supposed to sleep right now before he’s out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm gonna try to post more often cuz schools starting up in less than a month and i have no idea what kinda time i'll have when that happens and i don't wanna update any less often than i currently am. SO keep an eye out for that. 
> 
> this was literally *so much fun* to write and i really hope you guys enjoyed it, it's honestly one of my favourite chapters to date (although i have been thinking that about the past couple of them so maybe i'm just narcissistic. *shrug* who's to say)


	11. Hypnotic; Hypnotic; You're Leaving Me Breathless

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i could give you my laundry lists of reasons why this chapter is literally two weeks late (up to and including the fact that my dryer actually broke) but i'll spare you and instead gift you with a super long chapter filled with my own lore (cuz smeyer doesn't actually know how to write lore) and the promise of two chapters next week as penance. and the promise of some super iconic scenes coming up that i'm ridiculously excited to write. also i got a new keyboard! so formatting is back on track and i'm most likely gonna go back and fix the previous chapters too

The next day is delightfully rainy, coming down in buckets with thick, dark clouds blanketing the sky. Stiles smiles out his window and dresses for school in record time. He briefly has a moment where he wonders what he should wear but it passes with the realization that if Lydia actually cared she wouldn’t have talked to him in the first place, because his wardrobe of tee shirts, jeans, hoodies, and flannels is less than impressive. 

He gulps down some cereal and says goodbye to his dad, who shakes his head at Stiles’ excitement. Stiles just grins. 

Once he’s done he checks the clock and sees that there’s still a ton of time before he has to be at school and there’s no way that Lydia would be here by now. So he just has to fill all this time. 

There’s a knock at the door and Stiles stares at it for a moment before opening it. 

Lydia looks like a goddess in the rain. She’s wearing a black raincoat but the hood can’t cover all of her hair and the ends are drenched and curling. Her black coat cinches in at the waist and the light jeans she’s wearing look like they were made  _ specifically  _ for her legs with how well they fit. Her boots give her a few more inches of height but she still has to look up at him to give him a dazzling smile. Stiles loses his breath in an instant, all of it escaping in a rush the minute she looks up at him. 

“Morning.” She greets, her grin stretching to magnificent proportions as his eyes continue to drag over her body. She’s flushed again today and Stiles can’t keep his eyes off the subtle pink tint to her cheeks.

“Yeah.” Stiles replies breathlessly and Lydia giggles. “You’re early.” He manages to say once he makes eye contact once again. 

Not that it’s ever any easier to maintain a train of thought while looking at her eyes because they are literally incredible and he can’t think of anything but their colour when he looks at them. 

Lydia tugs on the hem of her jacket and bites her lip. “Do you mind?” 

“No!” Stiles almost shouts. She giggles again and Stiles squeezes his eyes shut in embarrassment before stepping aside to let her in. 

“I’m sorry I asked.” She teases and he groans good naturedly. 

“Not that I am at all upset about you being here early, but why are you early?” Stiles asks, plopping down into one of the kitchen table’s chairs. She sits next to him with far more grace than humanly possible. Obviously. 

“I wanted to see you.” She says matter of factly and Stiles can’t even help the way his eyes flutter shut as he hangs his head on a suddenly boneless neck. He groans again and is treated to Lydia’s laugh. The memory of her lips on his cheek rises unbidden, bringing a flush to his cheeks in its wake.

“You can’t just say things like that.” Stiles insists and she scoffs. 

“Why ever not? It’s the truth.” 

He looks back up at her and her brows are furrowed. 

“Because it’s just…it’s so…forward I guess?” Stiles struggles to explain. Lydia raises a perfect brow at him. 

“And you’d rather I dance around the fact that I enjoy your company immensely?” She asks pointedly. 

Stiles scrambles to correct her, “No, no, it’s not that. I’m just not used to people being to forward about their feelings. Generally they keep it to themselves until the right moment or something like that. I don’t have a whole lot of experience, honestly.”   

“Yes, well, the social dance is rather annoying for a mind reader.” She tells him and he snorts. 

“Yeah, okay, you make a point.” Stiles says. “And just, uhm, so you know.” He clears his throat uncomfortably, “I like spending time with you too.” He can feel the blood rising to his cheeks and doesn’t even try to stop it, as though he’s ever been able to. Her eyes drop to it and then back up to his. She lifts a hand and looks to him for permission. He nods and her heated fingertips graze against his cheekbone. She watches them with rapt attention.

“Why do you get flushed?” He asks, “You didn’t answer me last night.” 

Her hand leaves his cheek and lands back in her lap. She considers him for a moment before responding, “It’s a side effect, of…what we eat…what we are.” She takes a deep breath, considering Stiles’ expression. 

“We drink blood because we aren’t alive.” She explains, gauging his reaction closely. He keeps his face purposefully blank. “We need it to stay…animate, I suppose. It’s what makes us look so ‘vibrant’, as you put it. The flush is the side effect of the blood. It doesn’t process for us like it does for you. It’s…well mostly it’s difficult to explain, I’m finding. It’s only within the last sixty years or so that we’ve had such a solid grasp of anatomy and physiology. It’s hard to put mysticism into science.” 

“It’s okay if you can’t explain it.” Stiles assures her. A corner of her mouth ticks up. 

“Truth be told, my mother would probably be a better authority on this than I.” She says and he nods. 

“Makes sense.” 

Lydia chuckles despite herself. “Yes, well, she’s also a curious and determined individual. Come to think of it, that reminds me of someone.” Stiles gives her a withering look and she grins. After a moment of truly trying his best to keep his glare in place, he can’t help but grin back.

“I’ll ask her about it, when I get the chance.” Stiles says and Lydia smiles. 

“She’d like that, actually.” She says. She glances at the clock over the oven and sighs. “We should get going.” 

Stiles looks up and makes a noise of protest. “Alright, fine.” Lydia giggles at him but leads him out into the pouring rain once he has all of his stuff together. The rain soaks him immediately, seeping through his jacket and leaving it a dripping, freezing mess on top of his head.

He feels like a drowned rat by the time he’s seated in Lydia’s car. 

“Ugh.” He says. Lydia chuckles. 

“Yes, well, it  _ is  _ Washington.” She says and Stiles rolls his eyes at her. 

“Do I get to ask questions today?” He asks, trying not to betray how anxious he is for the chance, but the drumming of his fingertips against his leg can’t be helping his case. 

“I suppose it’s only fair.” Lydia relents, “But I get a turn tomorrow.” 

Stiles shrugs. “Seems fair to me.” 

She elegantly swirls her hand, revealing a small, gold bracelet and Stiles takes a second to parse out which questions to ask first. 

“Earlier, when we were talking a few days ago, you said you want- _ ed _ to study chemistry--past tense. What do you want to do now?” He finally asks. Lydia glances over at him, surprise evident on her face. 

“Truthfully, I’m not sure I know how to answer that.” She says, her eyes going back to the road through the streaked windshield, “I suppose I’ll always want to work with science, with advancement and knowledge and helping people. At the time, those weren’t my reasons, but now even more so. I see more now than I did then, as I’m sure many of my kind could say.” 

“And what do you mean by that?” Stiles asks. 

Lydia sighs. “I see how short sighted I was, how small my world had been, how little I’d wanted out of it. Of course, it had always been bigger for me than for the people around me. For them, the way things were was better than what they could be; to move on from tradition and into the future was dangerous.” 

“There are still people who believe that.” Stiles points out. 

“Yes, but it has lessened some. Not being at war with the whole world certainly helps.” Lydia says, looking at him out of the corner of her eye, assessing his reaction to this new piece of information.

“When were you born, Lydia?” Stiles finally asks, realising now that in the wake of everything else, he’d forgotten that particular quality of vampirism. He’d just thought she was the same age as him and just also happened to drink blood on her off hours. It just hadn’t occurred to him until right now. 

Lydia chuckles. “I was wondering how long you’d wait to ask that question. I was born in 1925. I was turned in 1945.” She tells him, her voice tense. He has to pause and think about that for a minute. 

“Wow.” He says. He can’t actually sort through all the things he’s currently thinking half of which being  _ what the fuck am I supposed to do with that  _ and the other half being  _ we’re after a girl who’s literally seventy years older than us what the fuck has it come to  _ which is particularly unhelpful. Yeah, he’s falling in love with a girl seventy years older than him, and yeah, he’s pretty fucking ecstatic about that, but no, he has no fucking idea what to do about it. 

Both in a traditional  _ I like a girl and I don’t know how to tell her lest I be painfully rejected  _ way and a  _ she literally lived through World War II  _ way. The latter is admittedly a little more difficult to deal with. 

“Is that…” Lydia trails off, her gaze sliding over to Stiles, “Is that alright?” 

“Is it alright that you’re, like, seventy years older than me?” Stiles raises an incredulous eyebrow, “Doesn’t really sound like something you have any say over.” 

Lydia rolls her eyes at him. “You know what I mean.” 

“Is it strange? .Absolutely, it raises about a million more questions, but it is the truth.” He shrugs. “That’s enough for me. So, you were twenty when you were…turned?”  

“Not quite. I was about a week away from twenty.” 

“That kinda sucks.” Stiles says and Lydia laughs. 

“Why do you say that?” 

“Well, you didn’t even make it to your twenties. That’s almost tragic.” He shakes his head.

“Stiles,” Lydia glances over at him, an eyebrow raised, “I’m seventy-two years old.” She tells him, and though the corners of her lips are twitching, her eyes are studying him surreptitiously, carefully blank.

Stiles blurts out the first thing that pops into his head. “Well you look great.” Lydia bursts into laughter, the bubbly sound filling her car and making Stiles think of a quote that called laughter carbonated holiness and he’s never really been one for religion but right now he gets it. 

“The perks of immortality.” She says sagely when her laughter dies down some. She’s still chuckling by the time they pull into the school parking lot. 

“Anything else?” Lydia asks. 

“Yeah, I’m not sure I’ll ever stop having questions. But we can do that later. Right now I have to deal with my friends and the fact that it looks like I’m still with you.” Stiles says, a flush rising up the back of his neck as they get out of the car. She circles around to stand in front of him.

“Still?” She asks, visibly confused. Stiles snorts. 

“Yes. Still.” 

“Oh.” She says, her eyes widening. She sounds a little surprised and maybe even a bit…pleased? No, that can’t be right. 

“ _ Anyways _ ,” Stiles hastens to say, mostly to stop his own train of thought, “I’ll see you in history?” 

Lydia chuckles. “Yes, you’ll see me in history.” Stiles nods and turns to go in the opposite direction. He can’t help looking back and sees her standing there in the rain, hands clasped in front of her and a small smile playing at her lips.  _ Fuck she’s beautiful,  _ his brain supplies. 

Homeroom is almost agony, waiting to go to history and watching the clock hands move at a nearly glacial pace. He tries to read the play for his final project in Lit but it doesn’t go well and he can’t tear his mind off Lydia long enough to focus on anything at all. He really hopes that doesn’t keep being the case over the course of their…whatever they are, because he needs to go to college at some point. 

He’s planning on going to community college before university since that’s so much cheaper. He wonders what Lydia will do, whether or not she’s going to college--for probably not the first time--if she’s planning on leaving this tiny town for somewhere similarly rainy or if she plans to stay awhile longer. He wonders how long it usually takes for people to notice they don’t age. His best guess would be about five years, since people generally aren’t very observant and because it’s a long jump between ‘those people look uncommonly good for their age’ and ‘there’s something fundamentally wrong with them’. 

Stiles guesses he’ll have to ask at some point in between his eight thousand other questions. He very pointedly doesn’t think about the fact that he only just turned eighteen, that he’s only just now getting started in the world and suddenly he’s wrapped around the little finger of a girl who is not only gorgeous and out of everyone’s league but immortal. What does that mean for the lifespan of a relationship with her? Relationships end one of two ways and only one of them seems plausible to Stiles in the current circumstances. 

Christ, he’s not even  _ dating  _ the girl yet and getting anxious over particulars like that. 

Finally he’s set free and he rushes to his history class to see Lydia already sitting at their table, her arms crossed over her chest, wearing a dark green, flowy shirt that had been covered by her coat. 

“Hey.” Stiles says, the grin on his face stretching to somewhat ridiculous proportions and he can’t do a thing to stop it. 

Lydia smiles back, her own grin wide and happy. 

“Hello.” She says and Stiles takes his seat next to her. 

“Is it weird for me to say it’s good to see you?” Stiles asks before his brain can catch up with his mouth. His brain tends to shut down a little when Lydia smiles. 

She chuckles. “Not at all. Likewise.” Stiles already feels lightheaded and he vows to get his shit together at some point. 

He doesn’t say anything for a moment, too busy staring at her and the gold flecks in her eyes, the pink tinge to her cheeks, the delicate bow of her lips. 

“Stiles?” Lydia asks gently and Stiles shakes himself. 

“Yeah?” He blinks a few times, trying to focus. 

“Shall I assume you’re done with interrogating for the day and I can take my turn?” She teases, her lips twitching and Stiles rushes to correct her. 

“No, I’m not done, not even close. But I’m not sure how much we can talk about…here.” He says, his eyes darting around the cramped classroom. 

“I’ll let you know if anyone gets suspicious.” She says, pointedly looking up at his forehead. Right, mind reading. Stiles shrugs.  

“Alrighty then.” He pauses to figure out what order he should ask his questions in and thinks he has the right idea when his mouth moves on without him and asks, “Can you eat regular food?” 

Lydia giggles.

“Well, no, not really. It still has taste and texture, but it’s simply not as good as the alternative.” She explains, again watching his reactions carefully, waiting for him to run screaming into the night, no doubt. “A few of my kind still eat food simply because they miss it, but it’s a somewhat disappointing experience. Both because it’s not as good as what we  _ do _ eat and because it’s not as good to us as it is for humans. One of the many disadvantages.” 

“One of many?” Stiles asks, entirely confused. 

She sighs, “Yes, Stiles, many.” 

“What else?” 

“The sun for one thing, though, I’m certain many view that one as an advantage--”

“Wait what does the sun do to you? My research conflicts.” 

Lydia rolls her eyes at his mention of his ‘research’. “Yes, I’m sure it does.” She twirls her pen for a couple seconds, silently. 

Finally, she says, “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.” 

“Lydia.” Stiles says pointedly, then points back and forth between them to illustrate  _ vampire-girl-and-human-boy-having-conversation-in-their-world-history-class. _

“I’m serious, you won’t.” She insists and Stiles narrows his eyes at her. 

“Try me.” 

She narrows her eyes. “Fine. How about I show you?” She offers up and Stiles blinks at her. 

“I’m going to assume that the sun doesn’t equal insta-death, then.” Stiles says and Lydia scoffs. 

“No, it does not.” She challenges, her tone one of superiority and offense. 

“Extremely good to know.” He says seriously.  

Lydia scoffs and rolls her eyes. 

“Are you going to prom this weekend?” She asks, her lips curling into a conspiritorial smirk and Stiles tilts his head at her, his eyebrows furrowing. 

“Nooo?” He says.

“Excellent. Then I can show you this weekend, if you’d like.” She offers and she honestly seems excited by the prospect.

“You really want to?” Stiles asks, somewhat disbelieving. 

She ducks her head slightly, smiling almost sheepishly. “Honestly?” 

Stiles nods. 

“I’m irrationally excited by the opportunity to flaunt. Isaac likes to tell me I’m an incorrigible show-off.” She explains, smirking. Stiles grins. 

“I can guarantee, with absolute certainty, that I will be impressed.” Stiles tells her, “And I’m decidedly willing to indulge you.” 

Lydia smirks, the same one from last week, the one that exposes her teeth in an almost dangerous, predatory way that should scare him, but doesn’t. It sends shivers over his skin, makes his heart pound against his ribs, makes him want to do things he definitely shouldn’t be thinking about in class and next to a girl who’s  _ very  _ well acquainted with his circulatory system.

“You may regret saying so.” She says and Stiles sucks in a breath so fast he’s almost lightheaded. Lydia snickers.

“I’m pretty sure I won’t.” Stiles says, trying to disguise the breathless quality to his voice and  _ failing. _

“We shall see, I suppose.” Lydia says cryptically and Stiles inhales sharply. 

He only has to get to Saturday to see what she means, to watch her be unabashedly herself, to see everything about her that he’s surmised but never actually seen--from a proper vantage point anyways. 

“It seems lonely.” Stiles suddenly says, realising how hard it has to be, to live their whole lives never actually being who and what they are. 

Her eyes grow exceedingly sad, looking too old for the nineteen-year-old face they’re looking out of. 

“It is. It can be. It depends.” Lydia explains haltingly. “It wasn’t awful, for me.” 

“Because you had your family?” Stiles surmises. Lydia nods. 

“I’m the most recent addition, if you don’t count Jackson.” 

“And who would want to count Jackson?” He says, trying to lighten the mood, and Lydia chuckles. 

“I just mean he joined our family after he had already been turned.” She explains and some of the sadness has left her eyes so he’ll call it a win. 

“So I wasn’t alone, in the beginning. I’ve heard it’s almost unbearable to be that alone and that different.” Lydia says quietly. “Victoria was alone for nearly a hundred years before she met Chris. I can’t even imagine.” 

Stiles doesn’t know what to say to that, and knows better than to try, so he lets the relative silence drift between them. 

“It’s better, I think, to have a family like mine.” She finally says, “Others of my kind drift, never settling, living as nomads. Some of them form covens or temporary groups for hunting or safety, but very few have a family, have the connection to each other that my family has. 

“But our particular lifestyle--fitting in with humans, playing these roles--makes us more susceptible to loneliness. We’re surrounded, every day, by people we can never fully know, because they can never fully know us. Like forever window shopping.” She sounds so sad it aches somewhere in Stiles’ chest. He reaches out without thinking about it and lays his hand over hers on the table. 

She flips her hand over and laces her fingers with his. He tries not to freak out about it, tries to keep his heart rate reasonable, but he knows he fails miserably. She offers him a smile, small and sad as it is. 

“That’s unbelievably nice.” She says, darting a look down at their joined hands. 

“I agree.” Stiles says and Lydia actually smiles this time. 

“You’re…cooler than I am. Your hand almost feels like…” She struggles for a comparison, “Like pressing your hand up to a window while it’s raining. Not freezing, but rather pleasantly chilled.” 

“I sound like a martini.” He says and Lydia laughs. 

“Yes, well, it is an apt comparison.” She says and Stiles shrugs, the motion jostling their joined hands but neither of them pull away. 

“I’ll take your word for it.” He says. She smiles at him. “I’m sorry, by the way, that it’s like that for you.” Stiles offers even though he knows it’s not even remotely enough. 

“Thank you, Stiles.” She squeezes his hand and he squeezes back. 

He imagines there’s a class happening around them but he couldn’t for the life of him express what the hell it was on or what they were doing or anything else even remotely relevant. And he’d thought it was bad  _ before  _ he’d had Lydia’s full attention. 

“And it’s not all bad.” Lydia says. 

“No?” 

“No.” She smiles at him and squeezes his hand significantly, her overly warm hand feeling so small in his and he remembers the truck body bending around the delicate fingers now laced with his all those weeks ago. 

“Good.” He says, and he means it. 

“Can I ask you a question?” She asks and Stiles smiles. 

“Absolutely not, who said this was an equal opportunity arrangement?” 

She scoffs and grins at him. 

“What do you want, Stiles?” Lydia asks, suddenly sobering. He cocks his head to the side, his eyes narrowing in confusion. She takes a breath and looks down at their hands. “I mean…what do you want, with me?” 

Stiles is too shocked to speak for a moment and Lydia barrels on in the face of his silence.  

“It’s simply that I feel like I’ve laid my cards out and you’ve left them on the table. I don’t think it’s disinterest, I may not be able to hear your thoughts but I’m not blind. Furthermore, if it’s some bout of misplaced chivalry I’d kindly ask you to leave it at the door, I may have been born seventy years ago but times have changed and I don’t miss the pomp and circumstance--”

Stiles is giggling by the end of her tirade and he interrupts her by squeezing her fingers. 

“Lydia,” He says and she looks up at him, her mouth still open, waiting to continue her speech, “Lydia are you asking me how I feel about you?” 

She scowls at him. “It sounds silly when you say it like that.” She says and Stiles chuckles. 

“It’s not silly, it’s important.” He takes a breath, prepares himself to just lay it all out there and let the chips fall as they may. 

The bell rings and Stiles’ head snaps up in confusion, sure they’d only just started class minutes ago. Lydia scoffs and picks her bag up off the floor and drags Stiles up by their still joined hands and leads him out of the room with barely enough time to grab his own things and stumble after her.  

She leads him outside into the pouring rain but they skirt around the side of the building and end up in a relatively dry alcove. There’s no one around them on account of the frankly biblical rain. 

“Please, continue.” Lydia says, not a hair out of place from their mad dash to the outside. Stiles is still catching his breath. 

“I was going to say,” He pauses to breathe, hooking his free arm around himself. 

“Stiles Stilinski, I will drain you dry right here.” She snaps and he laughs breathlessly. 

“Yes, yes, you’re very terrifying, creature of the night and all that.” He flaps his hand vaguely. “I was going to say that I like you. Like, a lot. And I’m not sure what to do about that, or what I’m supposed to do or say in that situation because I haven’t really done this before, but, God Lydia, I really like you.” He looks up at her and her eyes are so open and hopeful it propels him forward. 

He remembers himself before he can do anything too stupid and looks to her before slowly lifting his free hand and skating his fingertips across her cheek. Her eyelids flutter closed and he takes this as encouragement to cup her cheek, to just barely bury his fingers in her sunset-coloured hair. She inhales sharply and he freezes, worrying he’s done something wrong. 

Lydia’s eyes open and they  _ take his fucking breath away.  _ This moment, right here, is important. And Stiles can’t exactly say why it is or how he knows but it  _ feels _ different, the world around them just dripping away, leaving them alone in the rain, staring at one another. Her eyes seem just so fucking  _ green  _ and open and full and dazzling and they’re staring right at him, only at him, and his are raking over her, taking everything she is and deciding without any doubts,  _ yes _ .  _ Yes  _ to whatever happens next,  _ yes  _ to who she is--what she is as well,  _ yes  _ to whatever this means and wherever this takes them. 

Her lips part as she gasps, the heat of her breath fogging in the cold and Stiles wants to kiss her. He wants to know what her lips taste like, what they’d feel like against his, and to finally understand what all the fucking fuss is about because drunk fumbling in a closet at age sixteen left a quite a bit to be desired. 

“Stiles.” She whispers and Stiles braces himself. He waits to be told it can’t work out with them, that this has been fun but it isn’t sustainable. That she’s immortal and he’s not and that’s going to cause problems sooner rather than later and she can’t put her family at risk for one human boy. 

“Stiles, I’m falling in love with you.” Lydia says and Stiles loses all the breath in his body in a whoosh. “I don’t know what to do with that, either. But I want to figure it out, with you.” 

Stiles strokes his thumb across her cheek bone and she blinks up into his face. 

“Me too.” He tells her honestly, “But I need you to set the boundaries because I have no idea what I’m doing and you’ve got the whole vampirism thing to keep track of. I mean, I’ve never even dated a girl before, let alone a girl who isn’t even a girl and I don’t want to make this any harder for you than it has to be because I’m human and you’re not and I’m rambling, I’m rambling aren’t I?” Stiles finally rolls to a stop while Lydia giggles. 

“Yes, you’re rambling. And no, I won’t be setting the boundaries here.” She says and Stiles opens his mouth to protest and she stops him with a glare. “Trust me to tell you when something goes too far and I’ll trust you to do the same, yes?” 

Stiles ponders it a moment. “Seems reasonable. Really reasonable. You know we’re supposed to be bad at this at first, right?” 

Lydia scoffs, “Please, and waste time dancing around each other and stepping over lines that needn’t be crossed? No, thank you, I’ll pass.” She says and Stiles shakes his head at this utterly brilliant girl in front of him.

“Same.” He says and she grins at him, wide and happy--no, fucking  _ rhapsodic _ . 

The next bell rings and they race to their next classes and, reluctantly, away from each other.

Danny eyes him as he walks into engineering, soaking wet and grinning like a maniac. 

“So, I take it the date went well last night?” Danny asks and Stiles stares at him for a minute.  

“What?” 

“With Lydia?” Danny says, drawing it out in confusion. 

“Oh, yeah, that was great.” Stiles says and Danny laughs for a second. 

“Okay, and what has you so insufferably cheery right now?” He asks and Stiles glares at him. 

“I’m not insufferable.” Stiles insists and Danny snorts. 

“Fine, you’re just a peach to be around, would you just tell me?” 

Stiles glares at him on principle but is too excited to hold any of it in. 

“Lydia likes me.” Stiles says. 

“No shit?” Danny snarks at him and Stiles gives him a withering look. 

“She  _ likes me _ .” Stiles says and Danny does the equivalent of a cackle, but would probably skin Stiles alive for calling it a cackle. 

“What is this, middle school?” 

“Fuck, it might be, I have no fuckin’ idea what I’m doing.” Stiles says and though anxiety grips him like an iron vice the grin stays firmly plastered on his face. 

Danny not-cackles again and Stiles tries his best to scowl. 

“Look, dude, you already did the hard part.” Danny points out and Stiles narrows his eyes, “You got her to admit that she likes you and after that it’s all fun. I mean, you still talk about stuff, and you check in, but now you get to actually date her.” Danny shrugs. “You’re charming and you’re funny, you won’t have any trouble keeping her around. And if you ever tell anyone I said that I’ll--”

“Yeah, yeah, something gruesome and horrible.” Stiles says rolling his eyes. Danny smirks. 

“Exactly.” 

After they get started on their final project there isn’t much room in conversation for Stiles love life which had previously been nonexistent and the game he apparently has.  

The last fifteen minutes of class drag painfully by and when he’s finally set free he tries his hardest not to sprint to the cafeteria. 

She’s sitting at the table he’s now affectionately referring to as ‘theirs’ and she looks just as statuesque as ever and he has to take a bracing breath before he heads over. He walks past his friends and grins at Kira and Scott as Danny fills them in. 

“What are your friends talking about?” Lydia inquires and Stiles raises an eyebrow at her. She flutters her eyelashes innocently and Stiles does his best to scowl at her while his mind wanders to previously-off-limits zones and he’s ridiculously relieved that Lydia can’t read his mind. 

She smirks at him and he rolls his eyes at her as he sits down. 

“Danny actually gave me dating advice.” Stiles explains. 

“He’s very impressed with you.” Lydia says and he scoffs. 

“I’m sure it’s an insulting amount.” 

“Not at all. It’s fairly innocent, truth be told. He’s happy for you. They all are. Well, Scott was for a few seconds, and then went back to thinking about Kira.” Lydia explains and Stiles laughs.

“Good to know. And that’s probably all I should know.” He grimaces a little, “It’s not necessarily an invasion of privacy when you do it because you can’t really help it, but I’m not supposed to know any of that stuff. It feels like I shouldn’t.” 

Lydia smiles softly at him. “That’s incredibly endearing, you know.”

“What? Me not wanting to hear my friends’ innermost thoughts?”

“You’re concern for their privacy. Most people don’t think about things in the same way you do. Most people want all access passes to what people think about them. Then again, you’re not most people, are you?” Lydia says, cocking her head to the side and smiling at him. 

“Never have been.” He says, shrugging. 

“Yes, it’s one of the most attractive things about you.” Lydia says. Stiles goes red from his neck to his ears and struggles to maintain eye contact even as her eyes trail over the flush. She smirks.

“You--” Stiles pauses. “No, nope, I don’t want to know the answer to that question.” 

“Yes, I find you attractive Stiles.” Lydia says, leaning forward and bracing her elbows on the table, “Do you want to know what about you I find attractive?” 

Stiles can’t unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth so Lydia continues, her smirk growing. 

“It was your eyes first. I’ve never seen eyes like yours before, like whiskey and caramel and coffee all mixed together.” She says, “And your hair. It’s somewhat curly when it’s wet, Stiles, it’s very appealing.” She’s grinning now. 

“Alright, alright I get it, you think I’m cute.” Stiles protests, ducking his head and feeling like the back of his neck might set his shirt on fire. 

“Oh no, I wasn’t finished.” She says, her grin looking altogether too cocky for his liking, “I also like your shoulders. They’re much more broad than they appear under all your layers. The rain really does you multiple favours. And that’s not even saying anything of your arms or your hands. You have truly beautiful hands, Stiles, do you play the piano?” 

“No.” He answers, reluctantly enjoying the onslaught of compliments but feeling like he should be denying them in some way. Which is stupid, yes, but he can’t help it. 

“Oh, that’s tragic. I’ll have to teach you at some point.” She insists and Stiles is too overwhelmed to disagree. 

“I’m sorry, I’ll stop.” Lydia says, giggling, “I mean every word, but I’ll admit I’m being overbearing.” 

“Maybe a little.” 

“I simply want to show you you’re not at a disadvantage like I know you think you are.” Lydia insists, “You’re quite handsome, Stiles, and you deserve to know it.” 

Stiles rubs the back of his head uncomfortably and casts a look up at her through his lashes. 

“Thanks.” He says and she grins.

“You are most welcome.” She leans back in her chair and smiles, “At the risk of sounding trite or forward, do you want to get out of here?” She says, the decidedly modern statement sounding foreign from her. 

“That’s not--you don’t--” He sighs when she grins at him, “Don’t you have a class to get to?” She shrugs elegantly. 

“I have perfect grades, if slightly shoddy attendance. I can afford to be late to one class to take you home.” Lydia insists and Stiles shakes his head at her. 

“Sure.” He says, feigning a defeated tone. She grins and gracefully rises from her seat and starts walking off without him. 

She heads over to the table his friends are sitting at and smiles dazzlingly at them. 

He catches up to her to hear her say, “I want to thank you for lending me your friend for the last couple of days.” 

Kira is the first to recover and smiles back. 

“Does this mean we get him back tomorrow?” Kira teases and Lydia laughs her melodic laugh. 

“Absolutely not.” Lydia insists and Kira laughs. “I simply came over in the hopes of smoothing any potentially ruffled feathers about my psuedo-abduction.” 

“Our feathers are perfectly arranged, but thank you, Lydia. That’s really sweet.” Kira insists and Lydia beams at her. 

“Oh, Allison wanted me to remind you that your paper on  _ The Cave  _ is due next week.” Lydia says and Kira’s eyes widen. 

“Oh thank God, I totally forgot, thank you so much! Tell Allison I really appreciate it.” Kira requests and Lydia waves a dismissive hand. 

“Think nothing of it.” She insists and turns to Stiles, “Ready?” Stiles nods, still entirely too baffled with the exchange to do much more than that. 

She leads him out of the school and into her car. 

“Your friends are lovely, if a bit odd.” She says once they’ve started peeling out of the parking lot. 

“Thanks?” 

“You’re truly lucky to have them.” She says, a note of seriousness bleeding into her tone. 

“I know.” He says and she smiles softly at him. 

“Can I ask you a question you’re not gonna like very much?” Stiles asks and Lydia glances sideways at him. 

“Of course.” 

“I have no idea how to say this so I’ll just say it and you can’t judge me for how I say it.” He demands and she scoffs but she’s smiling. He nods decisively. “Do you have, I don’t know, bloodlust? Everything I’ve read suggests that vampires have an uncontrollable need for blood, that it goes even beyond hunger.” 

Lydia tips her head back and forth. “That’s sort of hard to explain without you having all of the context, but I’ll do my best.” She darts a glance over to him and adjusts her hands on the steering wheel. 

“Essentially,” She starts, “Blood is life force. It encompasses the needs of food and water and oxygen for us. It’s…more than that though. It’s so hard to describe, but it’s as though humans buzz with life. The scent of life is almost electric. It’s the craving for life that spurs the hunger, not the blood itself. It tastes…” She trails off, her eyes sliding over to him, “Nice, I suppose, but it’s not the taste that we crave. When you crave something, you have the taste, the texture in mind, yes?” Stiles nods, “I crave the eventuality, the feeling of livelihood. Does that make sense?” 

Stiles pauses, “Well, it makes enough sense. I don’t think I could actually understand it even if you gave me a full length text book on the topic. It’s one of those things you have to experience to understand.” 

“Yes, well.” Lydia says uncomfortably. 

“I have no intention of experiencing, Lydia, at least not in the near future which is a  _ whole other  _ conversation that doesn’t need to be had right now.” He says and Lydia chuckles. 

“Decidedly not.” She says as they pull onto his street. 

“I’ll see you tomorrow, right?” Stiles asks. 

“As long as Isaac says it’ll be cloudy tomorrow, then yes.” 

“Isaac?” 

“Isaac has limited precognition abilities.” 

“Holy shit.” Stiles breathes. “That has so many implications.” 

“Yes, and none of which you have to think about at the moment.” Lydia insists and leans over the center console once Stiles gets his seatbelt off. 

Her fingers land on his cheek and he inhales sharply and freezes, waiting to see what she’ll do. 

She leans forward and presses her lips softly against the corner of his mouth and  _ God  _ he wants to kiss her, wants to  _ really _ kiss her--soft and slow, hard and fast, chaste and warm--he wants it all. He wants to tangle his fingers in her hair and feel her sigh when he does something right. 

He stays still as a statue and curls his hands into fists to keep them where they should be--not on Lydia. 

“I’ll see you tomorrow.” She says in his ear and he can’t fight the shudder that skates ruthlessly down his spine.

“Yeah.” He whispers, his voice having left the operation the moment she’d leaned forward. 

He somehow manages to make it into his house and through his homework and making dinner while still in a fog. His dad asks him about his day when he gets home and Stiles tells him he and Lydia are kind of dating now. His dad grins and tells him how happy he is for him. 

Stiles is far too wired to go to bed at a reasonable hour so he starts  _ Firefly  _ up on his laptop and falls asleep to the main theme five episodes deep. 

The next two days are somewhat of a whirlwind. Lydia asks him every question she can think of, seemingly never running out of material. 

She asks about his family, his mom, his friends from childhood, his opinions on  _ everything _ . 

By the end of the onslaught Stiles is sure no one knows anyone as well as Lydia now knows him. He also manages to slip his own questions in there--or, rather, he manages to get her to answer her own questions with her answers--so now, maybe, he could give her a run for her money. 

She learns he’s never been one for bowling but could kick anyone’s ass at air hockey--she’d challenged him and he’d obviously accepted. He learns she makes fantastic lemonade despite not being able to taste it, which he had immediately disputed and had been promised a glass the next time she made some. 

She learns he’s broken his arm three times but no other major injuries had occurred. He learns she had been a cheerleader in the seventies but had to quit because it was too hard to conceal the whole vampire thing while doing a sport. The other members of her family had all discovered similar issues and Jackson in particular is still pretty pissed about it. 

And he’s happy, fucking  _ stupidly _ happy. He literally wakes up with a smile and feels like a goddamn cartoon character.

“Do you have a preference for what we do tomorrow?” Lydia asks him on Friday afternoon as they idle in front of his house. 

“Whatever you want to do, I want to do.” Stiles says and Lydia grins. 

“I was really hoping you’d say that.” She says and Stiles narrows his eyes at her, “Oh, don’t worry, I’m just going to take you somewhere I’ve always loved. It seems like the perfect venue for your potential demise.” She means it lightly, Stiles is pretty sure, but it’s also a warning. Or an out, which he won’t be taking. 

“I’m not scared of you.” Stiles insists and so fast he can’t even register the movement she darts across the car, coming to an abrupt stop millimeters from his nose, making him jump high enough to hit his head on the roof of her car. 

“Hmm.” She sniffs and kisses his nose. “Good night, Stiles.” She says and he pulls himself out of her car. 

“It’s not even four.” He refutes, shutting the door behind himself and waiting for the window to roll down.

“I’ll see you tomorrow morning?” She confirms and Stiles grins at her. She rolls the window back up and drives away. 

“See you tomorrow.” He mutters to the wet, open air and smiles to himself. And if he looks like an idiot while he does it, well, who’s around to see it? 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the quote about laughter Stiles is talking about is from Anne Lamott's TED talk "12 things i learned from life and writing" which i highly recommend anyone with any interest in writing or living watch


	12. You Gave Me Your Heart; I Asked You to Dance with Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *collapses* IT'S DONE oh my god you guys have no idea how long i slaved over this chapter it was so hard but it's here!!! ON TIME no less. i hope you guys love it as much as i loved writing it and appreciate that it's nearly 11k words on it's own. the meadow scene deserves it tbh

Stiles wakes up to his father knocking on his door. 

“Stiles.” He calls through the door and Stiles groans before getting up and throwing open the door and blinking blearily at his dad, who chuckles, two mugs of coffee in his hands and hands one over. Stiles takes it gratefully. 

“What?” Stiles croaks, his voice still as asleep as he is. 

“Lydia’s still coming to pick you up for your date, right?” His dad asks and Stiles tries to push through the fog enough to fully grasp the words his dad is saying. 

“Yeah,” He says, yawning hugely, “Yeah that’s still happening. Technically I insisted on driving so she’s not really picking me up, but yeah, she’s coming this morning.” He mumbles and the corners of his dad’s mouth twitch. 

“And that’s happening at 8:30, is it not?” 

It’s like pouring a cold bucket of water over him as he looks over at the clock on his nightstand. It’s now 8:05 and Stiles’ heart jumps into his throat. He technically has time to get ready, but that’s not why he freaks out. This is their first real date, a genuine,  _ actual  _ date. It’s a big day and apparently Stiles was planning to sleep through it. 

“Shit.” Stiles mutters and his dad laughs.

“Language.” He chastises but Stiles can’t take it seriously when it’s said through laughter and his dad should know this by now. Stiles gulps down as much of the coffee as he can before darting to the bathroom. 

He hurries through his routine, too excited to consider even a  _ medium _ speed. He briefly considers doing something with his hair after his shower as he stares at it in the foggy mirror, but it’s still Washington and whatever he attempted with it would melt away in the rain. 

So he leaves it and heads back to his room to get dressed in jeans and his usual tee shirt and flannel. He doesn’t have anything better even if he wanted to dress up, but Lydia already knows this so he should be good, right? What does one even wear to view the supernatural abilities of their vampire girlfriend?

Suddenly he remembers his mom helping him get ready for the one and only school dance he’d gone to and hears her laughing good-naturedly at his worries of looking like the absolute idiot fifteen-year-old him was. He smiles at the memory, despite the pang of sadness it brings. It’s a good memory, and it manages to settle him. Like his mom is helping him now. He can’t help but think his mom would’ve loved Lydia with her sharp wit and take-no-shit attitude. 

He checks the clock again--8:20--and sprints down the stairs. He pours himself a bowl of cereal and eats it with a speed that’s no doubt unnecessary but he can’t help rushing. He’s too wired. 

His dad chuckles at him but continues to nonchalantly sip his coffee. 

“What are you two doing today?” His dad asks and Stiles pauses in the massacre of his cereal. He cocks his head. 

“I actually have no idea.” Stiles tells him, somewhat truthfully. He doesn’t know  _ exactly  _ where they’re going, but he knows they’ll be outside and most likely hiking. He’s so far been choosing to ignore that part of the day’s itinerary. 

His dad raises his eyebrows at him. “And that’s alright with you?” 

Stiles shrugs, “She said she had something to show me. We’re going hiking, I think.” 

At this his father’s eyebrows climb higher. “And you’re alright with that?” He asks again and Stiles shrugs--again. “Some girl.” He whistles. 

“You’ll probably understand when you meet her.” Stiles explains, both because Lydia is many, many levels of beautiful but also well-spoken and kind and so singularly unique it’d be hard to miss even without knowing what she is. His dad will see that and most likely understand it all. 

“Hey, if you’re happy, kid, I’m happy.” 

Stiles grins. “I know.” Apprehension starts to climb its way into his head and Stiles can’t stop himself from asking, “Hey dad, what do I do?” 

His father reacts predictably: with absolute and utter confusion. 

“About?”

Stiles huffs, not exactly sure how to say everything he wants to know because there’s just so much there. He has no fucking idea what he’s doing. “I mean, like, what do I  _ do _ ? How do I keep this going? Like, it’s good, it’s so good and she’s too good and I don’t know how to keep her interested and, hell, I don’t even know anything about relationships, what if I do it wrong?” He looks up at his dad, scared out of his mind all because while he’d been busy worrying about the fact that the girl he likes is a vampire he completely forgot to worry about  _ liking a girl. _

His dad forces a smile down and regards him with patience and a healthy dose of amusement. “First, calm down. You’re overthinking it.” He shoots Stiles a reassuring smile before continuing, “Second, she’s already interested, bucko. You don’t have to do anything other than what you’ve been doing. Be yourself, ‘cause that’s who she likes.” Stiles takes a breath. 

“Third, you can’t do a relationship wrong--barring hurting the other person, of course--they’re personal. You do what feels good, what feels right, and go from there. And every relationship you’re in is gonna be different, because  _ people _ are different. I’ll give you some advice I wish I’d had at the start of it all, but you gotta do what  _ you  _ gotta do. You’ll know if it’s wrong even if you don’t know what’s right, and that’s a good place to start. Right?”

“Right.” Stiles agrees, nodding. His father grins. 

“Here’s my advice: listen more than you talk, be honest, and make sure she knows--every day--how much you care about her.” 

“That’s the secret?” Stiles asks and his dad laughs. 

“It’s one of them. It’s a good place to start, at least. You gotta figure the rest out on your own, yeah?” 

“Yeah.” Stiles says, sounding about as unsure as he feels. 

There’s a knock at the door and Stiles jumps up to answer it, his dad following behind him, poorly concealing his chuckling. 

“Be cool.” Stiles murmurs to his dad, who raises his hands in surrender. Stiles narrows his eyes at him but opens the door anyways. 

Which is somewhat of a mistake because Lydia is once again as arrestingly gorgeous as always. Her hair’s down today with half of it pulled back, her face fully open and flushed. She’s been flushed everyday the past three days and Stiles is pretty sure she’s doing that for his benefit so he feels safer around her. It’s unnecessary, but sweet. She’s wearing a dress today, red with white flowers and hugs her form perfectly before flaring out around her legs. Her green jacket follows the silhouette and she smiles dazzlingly up at them.

“Good morning.” She says and Stiles clears his throat. 

“Morning.” He answers, his voice sounding far less dazed than he’d half expected it to be. He steps to the side to let her in and she basically floats through the door. 

“Hello Sheriff Stilinski.” She greets, holding out her hand. His dad takes it, clearing his throat.

“Really, Noah is fine.” His dad insists, relinquishing her hand, “It’s nice to meet you, Lydia. I’ve heard a lot about you.” Stiles turns to glare at him. 

Lydia grins. “Likewise, Noah.” 

“So what are you two up to today? Stiles mentioned hiking?” He says, obvious disbelief colouring his tone. 

Lydia giggles, “Yes, we’re hiking today. Nowhere too far nor very high up. I want to show him a place I found a few years ago.” She explains and Noah nods. “We promise to be safe.” She smiles her dazzling smile, dimples and all and Stiles knows no one is a match for that, not even his dad. 

“Well you two be careful, alright?” He says and tries to hide the fact that he’s judging her choice of outfit fairly heavily. At least she’s wearing boots that could probably be considered suitable for hiking. Stiles on the other hand doesn’t own suitable-for-hiking shoes so he’ll just have to make due with his tennis shoes. 

_ This should be fun. _

“Ready?” Lydia prompts to Stiles and Stiles nods decisively, shooting a smile to his dad who does the facial-expression-equivalent of a thumbs up. Stiles rolls his eyes and grabs his keys from the hook by the door and shoots off a sloppy salute as she shuts the door behind them. 

“Shall we?” Stiles says, gesturing to his jeep. Lydia shoots him a playful scowl before vaulting herself into the jeep and making a show of buckling her seatbelt, a beatific smile on her face. 

Stiles snorts but joins her all the same and peels out of his driveway. 

“Alright, where are we going?” Stiles asks. 

“Oh, I thought since you wanted to drive you knew.” She responds coyly. Stiles shoots her a withering look and she sighs theatrically. “Right out of your neighborhood, left on Main, highway until I say."

Stiles nods and does as he’s told. 

“No twenty questions?” She teases and Stiles internally cringes. 

“Is that annoying?” Stiles asks, insecurities creeping in despite his best efforts. 

“Oh no, quite the opposite.” Lydia responds and it brings Stiles up short even if it fills him with relief. 

“Why?” 

“Because I don’t have anyone in my life to talk to like you. Everyone I associate with is a vampire, they don’t have questions about the lives they lead.” She points out, “But you’re filled to the brim with them, constantly. It’s delightfully refreshing, having a new way to look at things, viewing my own life through the eyes of someone with…absolutely no context, comparatively.” 

“Huh.” Stiles thinks about that, “Yeah, okay, I could see that.” 

“So no, it’s not annoying. I’ve rather come to enjoy it, now that I don’t have to come up with clever ways to deter you.” She explains and Stiles grins. 

“I do have one that I’ve been thinking about for a while.” 

“Should I be frightened?” Lydia inquires lightly. 

“No, it’s a pretty harmless one.” 

“Then don’t let me stop you.” She gestures for him to continue. 

“Would you,” He falters for a second, knowing that this subject might be touchy, maybe painful, for her, “Would you want to tell me about your family? The one before you were a vampire.” He tries to clarify, feeling all sorts of uncomfortable asking but remembering when she told him about her mother and her lemon bars. He’d felt close to her, then, less like there was so much between them; humanity and vampirism and seventy years and wildly different experiences. More like they were both just people with pain. 

Maybe it’s selfish of him, but with the possibilities of the day before them--the things he might learn about her that would bring her completely out of the realm of normality, out of his reach, in a way--he wants the proof of her…humanity. Of the parts of her that are like him. 

Lydia smiles a sad smile at him when he glances to the side. 

“I would.” She says softly and Stiles breathes a sigh of relief, “But you may not like everything you hear.” 

Stiles shoots her a small, but what he hopes is encouraging, smile. “Lydia, you had a life, completely independent of this one. I’m not expecting to understand it all. I don’t have to get it or be okay with it, it’s your  _ life _ . And I like  _ you _ , not just the person you are now, all of you.”

She rolls her eyes, but Stiles can tell there’s something underneath the playful display, “You say that without even knowing the person I was then.” 

Stiles shrugs, “So, introduce me.” 

Lydia studies him for a moment, then sighs and settles back into her seat. 

“Alright.” She takes a deep breath. “My name was Lydia Martin. I was the beautiful daughter of one of the richest men in Georgia. My mother was one of the most popular socialites in the state, especially in our tiny hometown and she was beautiful and regal, conducting court in tea room after tea room. Ladies clambered to be seated at the same table as her, threw everything they had into their images, their reputations.

“Mothers from all over were vying for her attention. After all, if they could impress the wife, they could impress the husband. And the husband controlled the daughter.” Lydia pauses, glancing over at Stiles. He nods, seeing her eyes on him through the corners of his. 

“With the daughter came power--as long as their son married her. Money, pedigree, luxury, anything one could ever want.” 

“Lydia.” Stiles starts, not really knowing how he wants that statement to end, only knowing that the concept irks him. 

“There was one family--” She continues, as though he hadn’t spoken, “They called them new money--who’d made quite the impression on my mother. Their son was young and handsome and in line to take over his father’s company. My father saw the opportunity to open the door for a merger between their two companies and my mother, for all her faults, genuinely liked their son. His name was Aiden.” She says, “And I was eighteen when we met.” 

“You only knew him for, like, a year?” Stiles asks. Lydia laughs, but the sound is harsh. 

“I knew him for an evening before he proposed. He liked me.” She shrugs, “Well, he liked the way I looked anyways. That was all that mattered at the time.” 

“Did you like him?” Stiles finds himself asking, and it’s genuine curiosity rather than jealousy talking. He’s completely sucked into the story. 

Lydia shrugs again, “He was fine, I suppose. Somewhat overbearing and maybe a little arrogant but almost every man I’d ever met was. I was used to it. And I’d known I wasn’t going to find love, that love was something in movies and fairytales. It wasn’t for beautiful daughters of businessmen. He was handsome and he could be sweet sometimes, if he really tried. At the time, I’d convinced myself that that was enough.

“We dated, if one could call it that, chaperoned walks and car rides and other outings. I don’t think we were ever really alone together save one moment after the wedding date was announced.” She hesitates, looking down at her lap and playing with her bracelet, “He kissed me. He wasn’t supposed to, it was completely outside of propriety and I’d loved it. Not the kiss itself, of course, that had nothing to do with it. I’d liked that he was willing to ignore all the rules set before us and take what he wanted, damn the consequences. I’d wanted to do the same thing multiple times over for one reason of another.

“My mother…” Lydia huffs, “My mother cared, in her own way. She gave me…advice…on being married and being a mother and then, of course, being a socialite. ‘We move on’ she used to say,” She changes her voice slightly, makes it a little bit deeper when she speaks for her mother, “‘We move on, and we keep our heads. That is how we get by’. I think it was the only way she pulled our family through the depression and then the war. The depression didn’t really touch us, my father was, above all things, distrustful and he kept some money on the side. Never was much of an investor or a one for installments. In hindsight, that was really quite clever of him.” She says distantly, detached, like she’s talking about someone she’s never met. 

“The war was different, in a way. I watched a lot of boys go to war when I was still a teenager. Boys hardly older than me that went off to fight and die for a cause they knew nothing about. At the time, information was easier to control, easier to manipulate. It was easy to get men to fight for your cause when you appealed to their desires, their want to be men.” She pauses, smoothing her skirt over her legs. She looks back up at him.  

“I had a sweetheart, you know.” She says, smiling. Stiles smiles too. 

“Really?”

“Oh yes. Well, I suppose you have to actually  _ be  _ sweet on somebody to have a sweetheart and I don’t think I was.” She flashes Stiles a somewhat embarrassed look, “I think I fell in love with the  _ idea  _ of him, of the possibilities he presented.

“His name was Sebastian. And he was poor and earnest and kind in a way I hadn’t known until him. And he went to war for me.” Her voice changes a little, goes a little flatter, “He’d said he had to prove himself to my parents, had to be the man I deserved. His family found out he was killed in action less than a year later.” 

“I’m sorry.” Stiles says. Her lips tip up slightly, a tiny acknowledgement.

“After that I think I gave up. Gave up defying my parents, gave up on the idea of happiness, or love. I think I gave up on myself, too. I think I’d had this…idea in my head, this hope, that once Bash came back we could leave.” Lydia stares out the windshield, lost in her past and in telling her story, “Maybe I could go to college. My mother would’ve never allowed it if I stayed.

“I wanted something more than the life my mother had made for me.” She says, shaking herself and looking over at him, “And the man who loved me died for it.” 

“I’m so sorry, Lydia.” Stiles whispers, “I can’t…I can’t even imagine.” 

“Yes, well, guilt does funny things to people. It made me willing to marry a man I really didn’t like all that much, and throw away any and all possibilities of a different life.” She tries to smile, tries to lighten up the tone, but it falls flat.

“Did you marry him?” He asks. 

“No. I didn’t.” She fiddles with her bracelet. “I ran. Just…packed up his car and left. I didn’t really know how to drive, but I managed to get myself out of town.”

“What made you leave?” 

“Bash’s mother, actually.” Lydia looks up at him. “On what would’ve been his twenty-first birthday I went to his grave, gave him some flowers. I…spoke to him, for the first time. I told him I was scared, and I didn’t want to get married. I didn’t want to be a wife or a mother or anything at all like my own mother. I wanted to learn, wanted to be more than everyone thought I was. I wanted to be the person Bash had thought I was.

“She was there too, his mother. She’d heard me talking to her son and she just…touched me,  _ reached me _ , in a way no one had until then. Told me to go. Said I deserved a chance at a life better than the one I had, as beautiful and rich as it was. She told me it was better to own nothing, have not one cent to your name, and have love and happiness and family than it was to be rich and lonely.” Lydia coughs a tiny laugh. 

“I didn’t know whether or not she was right, but I wanted to find out.” 

“So, what happened?” Stiles asks, feeling like they’re leading up to something. 

“I lost control of the car, went over the edge of the road and into a ravine.” 

“Shit.” Stiles breathes. 

“I should’ve died.” She says and smiles wryly at him. “But Isaac knew I wasn’t going to. He found me and turned me. He almost couldn’t control himself, almost killed me. But he didn’t.”

“Good.” Stiles says. She smiles genuinely now. 

“Yes, I find I agree with you most days.” 

“And that’s that?” 

“For the most part.” She says, “I got what I’d wanted after all, I got a new start, I even went to college at one point in the fifties.” 

“That’s awesome.” 

“Yes, it was.” She grins, “Even the rampant sexism within the science department couldn’t sour the experience.” 

“I’m glad you got to do that, Lydia.” He tells her and she tucks a piece of hair behind her ear. 

“As am I.” 

“Did you check in on your family?” He finds himself asking. Her expression goes distant. 

“I did. About five years after I was presumed dead I went back. They’d taken in a little girl when I’d died, primed her to be what I wasn’t. Aiden got married to someone else, even had a child with her. They…lived their lives.” 

“I’m sorry.” 

“Why?” She asks, genuinely confused. 

“Because that has to hurt, seeing everyone you loved just moving on with their lives like you weren’t even there.” 

“I suppose it did, at the time. Now I feel relieved. I didn’t leave anyone behind, at least not significantly.” 

Stiles doesn’t know what to say to that and the silence hangs between them. The fact that he’s been resolutely ignoring comes roaring in at full speed. 

_ She’s immortal, you’re not.  _

It doesn’t help to hear it again, not really, but he can’t help but feel so insignificant in this moment, listening to her talk about the life she led more than fifty years before he had even been born. She’d lived more than him in those nineteen years and even more since and he’s young, so young in the face of all of that. 

And by the end of all of this, he’ll be exactly like her family before; living without her. It may be melodramatic to think so, but he doesn’t want to. Living without this completely extraordinary girl who is brilliant and kind and so much more than a vampire seems like a special kind of grief he’s not so keen on experiencing. 

After a while, when he can’t stand the tension or the reeling of his own thoughts, he hesitantly asks, “Can I ask more?” 

“Far be it from me to stop you.” She says, her expression starting to clear of some of the clouds that had been covering it as she looks over at him. Stiles nods decisively. 

“Okay so there are a couple other things I looked into when I was researching and I wanna know what’s bullshit and what isn’t.” He starts. 

“Alright.” She huffs a tiny laugh.  

“Do you have to be invited into places?” He asks and she laughs. 

“No. No I do not.” Lydia explains, still giggling a little. Stiles grins at the sound, finally feeling the tension melt away, finally able to push his own thoughts out of his head for a little while. “It’s a myth. It’s based on the idea that the demonic can’t go anywhere they’re not welcome, but vampires aren’t demonic, at least not real ones. Victoria likes to say we’re an extra step on the evolutionary ladder, just a step up from humans.” 

“So, there’s no magic involved?” Stiles can’t help but ask. 

“Oh I’m sure there is, or at least there was, in the beginning. But I think it’s somewhat accurate to say that something Other had something to do with the creation of everything.” Lydia muses. 

“I thought you were a woman of science.” He says, chuckling a little. 

“Oh I am.” Lydia immediately corrects, “Which means I have a firmer grasp on the possibilities. You forget, I watched all the advancements as they happened. The Miller-Urey experiment, the RNA Model, all of it. All the theories brought forth and proven and disproven, I’ve seen it all. Within all of that and being what I am, I have to guess that there may have been a push, just a spark, that got everything going. Of course after that nature did her job. Creationism is somewhat small minded, in my opinion, but not entirely without potential.” She explains. 

“You’re incredible, did you know that?” Stiles says and she smiles softly, just a small upturn of her lips and Stiles is sure if she had the ability, she’d be blushing. 

“Thank you.” She says. “I just think there’s so much out there that we do and don’t understand, my own existence included, and the only things keeping us from learning is the small perspectives we have.” 

“Do you think you might have more perspective?” 

“Yes and no.” She insists, “I have more experience, therefore more perspective. Victoria has quite the view of the world, having watched it grow and change for centuries. There’s only so much perspective people with only eighty years to their lifespans can have. But I’m still the same person, at my core, that I was before I became what I am. My perspective may always be coloured by that.” 

Stiles thinks about that for a minute. “Do you think that most humans are small minded?” He tries to ask it lightly, to make it seem like the answer doesn’t matter, but she knows him.

She darts a look over, startled. 

“Of course not.” Lydia says, her tone shocked, “I only mean to say that humans have--there’s a certain--I’m not sure I can explain it.” She says. She looks over at him and bites her lip. 

“Try?” 

She takes a breath. “Humans view the world with…a smaller lens. How could you possibly think big when you only see a third of the picture?” 

“So if you replace the lens, give them a bigger one?” Stiles asks, knowing she knows they aren’t speaking in generalizations anymore. 

“I believe that would change things for many of them. That so many just need the right view.” She says meaningfully, smiling. He relaxes a little. 

“This is your exit.” She suddenly points and he gets off the highway, turns at her direction and ends up on a dirt road. They make it to a trail head after some time, and he parks. 

“Okay, so,” Stiles eyes the woods, “We’re actually hiking?” 

Lydia giggles, climbing out of his jeep. Stiles follows her. “Not really, no. I wanted to show you some of that speed you’ve read so much about.” There’s a glint of mischief in her eyes and Stiles’ face splits with a grin. 

“Oh my god, you have no idea how cool that is.” He says and she grins back, hers possibly as wide as his. 

“You might not like the method, though.” She warns and he raises an eyebrow. She divests herself of her coat and tosses it onto her seat before walking around the jeep to stand next to him. She spins and holds her arms out in the universal pose for a piggy-back ride. 

“You’re right, I don’t like the method.” Stiles says. He sighs and swallows his pride before climbing on to his tiny, tiny girlfriend’s back, feeling like an adult in one of those elementary school kiddie chairs. 

_ Girlfriend!  _ A voice in his head practically squeals and he shushes it with little mercy. Not the time. 

“Hold on tight.” She says and he complies, wrapping his arms around her shoulders. “Keep your eyes open if you can.” Her voice is light,open, almost  _ giddy. _

She moves. 

For a moment his brain can’t process what it’s seeing, the trees flying by so fast they blur and the wind whipping through his hair and pulling his shirt taut against his arms. And then he forgets all about how ridiculous he feels, forgets about anything other than the  _ rush  _ of motion and the air flying past him, deafening him. Doesn’t think about anything other than the feeling of weightlessness, as though Lydia’s flying rather than running. 

He doesn’t know how much time passes, all of it seeming to exist in this one second. Everything feeling fast and slow and endless and fleeting, one moment where he’s flying through the woods at speeds he shouldn’t be able to travel and wrapped around the girl he’s falling in love with. His heart pounds in his chest and a breathless laugh leaves him, the wind catching it and blowing it leagues behind them. 

Finally she slows, coming to a stop slowly to give him time to acclimate. She lets him down, looking over at him with the widest grin, her face red as ever, eyes lit up and wide, and her hair wind blown and beautiful, a leaf caught in it by her ear. He stumbles on unsteady feet, his ears ringing with the lack of whooshing air but laughs all the same, regaining his balance faster than he’d thought he would. 

“Holy shit.” He breathes, laughing. 

“Exhilarating isn’t it?” She gasps and he grins 

“I don’t know how you get around any other way.” 

“Why do you think I drive so fast?” She asks, lifting a superior brow, but the expression melts quickly to make room for pure elation. 

“That’s…that’s fucking brilliant.” He says, still out of breath but regulating quickly. 

He steps forward and pulls the leaf from her hair. She giggles and looks up at him, biting her lip. 

“Do you want to see what I came to show you?” Lydia asks, looking excited but maybe a little nervous too. Stiles grins down at her, taking her hand and lacing their fingers together. He marvels at how easy the action is, how natural it feels to take her heated hand and hold it in his own. 

“Absolutely.” He tells her, the honesty and excitement apparent in his voice. 

She smiles, her lip still pulled between her teeth until the smile becomes a grin, the excitement winning out over the nerves, it seems.  

She pulls him forward and walks between two trees. He follows and gasps as they emerge. 

It’s a meadow, that’s the only word he can think of for the idyllic landscape before them. Long, brilliantly green grass in a circle, surrounded on all sides by trees. Purple, pink, white, and blue flowers are scattered over the clearing, popping up in tufts of grass and swaying with the slight breeze. 

This high up, they’re above the cloud bank and the sun glitters over the dew covered grass and lights the whole place up in brilliant green. It reminds him of her eyes. 

He turns to look at her and she’s standing just within the shadows cast by the trees. 

“You don’t have to show me, if you don’t want to.” He insists, and despite his curiosity, he genuinely means it. They do things at the pace they’re both comfortable with, and if she’s not ready, that’s okay. 

“No, no I want to.” She tells him and he thinks she might be reassuring herself as much as him. 

“Okay.” He says and steps out into the meadow. Her hand stays in his and she almost follows him, but her fingers slip through his. Stiles smiles encouragingly at her, but turns and steps further into the meadow, giving her time and space to herself, marvelling at the beauty in front of him. He hadn’t thought places like this actually existed outside of fairy tales. But he’s standing in the proof, feeling the long fronds of grass brushing against his pant legs and breathing in the scent of the flowers around him. He pulls a white one from its stem, leaving only a tiny length of green at the end of it and turns to give it to Lydia. 

His heart stops. 

She’d taken a step out into the light. For a moment, Stiles thinks she’s on fire and his stomach bottoms out and he’s rooted to the spot. But the longer he stares, the more time he has to process, he realises she’s…shining.

Her skin looks like it’s covered in prismatic shards of glass, the light reflecting off every inch of her bare skin, shooting off in every direction in every shade of visible light. His breath leaves him in a gasp and his eyes trail over all the skin he can see. 

Her legs shimmer, glittering and  _ glowing  _ in the morning sunlight, like a million diamonds embedded in her normally creamy-white skin. 

Her arms are the same, the light glancing off of every curve of her, the light shifting and changing as she moves, her hand outstretched to him. 

His eyes follow the lines of her, up over her shoulders and across her collar bones, the sun lighting them up with fervor. Her chest sparkles with it, the parts of her that normally appear flushed flare with light-pink-tinted light. 

But nothing, no amount of time, or preparation, or warning could have prepared him for looking up into her face. He gasps again, a fully-bodied sound, like he can’t possibly get enough air. 

The sunlight glimmering off of her face is stunning,  _ staggering _ , her cheeks gleaming pink and the skin around her eyes shining lightly purple. Her eyes seem to glow as well, the green of them somehow not overshadowed by her skin lighting up the whole meadow, seeming to draw all of his attention as they always have, so  _ fucking  _ **_green_ ** his heart almost  _ aches  _ with the beauty before him. 

The being in front of him is not human. She’s so undeniably  _ other  _ in this moment, the meadow completely eclipsed by her ethereal intensity, the light flashing off of her and shining over the blades of grass and flowers. 

He wants to do something, offer something, perform some task but he doesn’t even know what he would do and she’s staring at him with fear on her face and he can’t leave her hanging that long while he tries to get his scrambled brain to form any kind of coherent thought. 

“Woah.” He whispers, his voice completely breathless, barely any sound leaving him at all. 

“Stiles?” Lydia questions, her voice unsure and her face worried. 

“Lydia.” He gasps, feeling like there isn’t enough air in the whole _world_ , let alone in this tiny meadow so overshadowed by her. 

“Are you…alright?” She asks and he laughs suddenly, finally catching his breath. 

“Oh my god, Lydia, you’re so fucking  _ beautiful _ .” He tells her, the most honest thing he thinks he’s ever said. 

She smiles hesitantly and her hand flexes in the air. He reaches for her, his fingers brushing hers and she links them. He holds her hand aloft though, bringing it close to his face, feeling the need to squint from the light glancing off her. 

He runs the fingers of his other hand over the inside of her arm, looking up at her for a moment, asking permission. She nods, her eyes watching him with as much intensity as he’s watching her. The shimmer of her skin disappears under his fingers and as the skin moves so does the light, arcing this way and that as he turns her hand over and over in his.

He looks back up into her face to see it still pinched with worry, her eyes staring intently at the points of contact between them.

“What’s wrong?” He whispers. She looks up at him, startled. 

“I’ve just--” She pauses and takes a deep breath, “I’ve never shown this to anyone, not anyone who didn’t have the same…quality. I’m finding it somewhat unnerving.” Her eyes flick to his forehead, “And I don’t even know what you’re thinking.” 

“I don’t know if  _ I  _ know what I’m thinking.” He admits, “It’s a jumble in here. You’re…dazzling. And all kinds of gorgeous and so not human but in the best way. Your eyes are somehow brighter and I’m stuck staring at them as I always am but I’m literally stuck. I can’t look at anything other than you.” He tells her honestly, his stream of consciousness the only words in his head and the only ones his brain has to send to his mouth. 

She smiles slightly, the barest up tick of her lips, sending light scattering. 

“Lydia, I can’t even put into  _ words  _ how amazing this is, how amazing you are. I don’t know enough words.” He almost bemoans. He wishes he did, wishes he was better with words, wishes he could know exactly what to say to make her see what he’s seeing, make her glimpse even a portion of the overwhelming magnificence he has in front of him from his eyes. 

He wishes for the first time that she could read his mind and see what he sees right now. 

“I wish I could show you.” He says and she actually smiles now. 

“It’s okay. I like that I can’t read your mind.” She insists and Stiles raises an eyebrow at her, his hand momentarily pausing on the inside stretch of skin between her elbow and her shoulder. “Truly,” She says, “It’s so…quiet. In a way it never has been, for me.” She smiles at him and despite his best efforts the insecurities sweep in. 

Is that why she’s still here? Because he gives her some peace and quiet? Because he’s finally a break from the incessant noise around her? 

“Stiles, no.” Lydia immediately tells him, squeezing his hand in hers lightly, “It’s not how you’re thinking about it. Let me try to explain it to you?” 

He studies her, the earnest expression on her shimmering face, and nods slowly, wary that she’ll tell him something to ease ruffled feathers and not the truth. 

But, since he’d found out about her nature, she’s never lied to him. He doesn’t think she’s the kind of person to start now, when it’s so important. 

“I don’t hear everyone’s thoughts all the time.” She starts, “I have to focus on a person, seek out their mental voice, in a way. When I speak to someone I hear what they’re about to say before they say it. I hear what they think of me, of their day, their life in general. I get snippets of their lives in the moments that I focus on them.” 

“Okay?” 

“So you aren’t the only moment of quiet I get.” She insists, “It’s just that I like…” She ducks her head. “I like  _ hearing  _ you talk, hearing your voice. It’s…” She struggles for the words, “Soothing.” 

She looks back up at him, her eyes pleading with him to understand. 

He considers it for a moment, thinks about it critically. It’s better, knowing that he’s not the only calm in a storm of voices in her head. That she gets silence more often than he’d thought, but that with him, it’s like she’s talking to  _ him _ , like she’s finally having a conversation again, not just waiting for the other person’s voice to catch up with their thoughts. 

“I get to get to know you in the way  _ humans  _ do, with conversation and time and willingness to learn.” She says, her voice warm and excited. “It’s so much better, to have to work for something that’s been handed to you for so many years, if a bit difficult in the beginning.” Her lips tilt into a wry smile and he finds himself smiling back at her.  

“Okay.” Stiles finally says, “I think I get it. And I can see how that would be nice.” She grins at him, the sheer happiness in it so fucking  _ overwhelming  _ that he leans forward, not sure what he’s doing or where he’s going but propelled forward all the same. 

“Stiles.” She whispers, the sound of it skating across his nerves and lighting them up with sensation. 

“Yeah?” He whispers back. 

“I don’t know…” She licks her lips, her eyes darting to his lips and back up to his eyes, “I don’t know what I’m doing.” She stares at him. 

“I don’t either.” He breathes and decides to take the leap, knowing that if he does something wrong she’ll tell him. 

He leans the rest of the way forward, his hands dropping from her arm to her waist, reeling her into him and dipping his head until his lips find hers. 

He’s seen kisses described like fireworks, like explosions and ferocity and bright, instant feelings. This is nothing like that. This is slow, and soft, and  _ deliriously  _ good _.  _ Her lips are smooth and warm under his, the fullness of them so inviting he almost melts. His hands move across her back, bringing her forward and against him, every curve of her lining up with every line of him, thigh to torso. She gasps and he tilts his head, one of his hands coming up to cup the side of her neck as he deepens the kiss. 

And then he feels like he’s soaring. She makes a soft noise in the back of her throat and his hand buries itself in her fiery curls. She tastes like nothing he’s ever tasted, sweet like honey and strawberries and lemons but also nothing like that and feels like a finale and a beginning all at once. His heart races in his chest and her hands find a way into his hair, tugging lightly at the strands as he pulls her impossibly closer, one hand at her back and one tangled in her curls.

He finally breaks away, needing air to his great annoyance. Lydia’s breath comes in soft little pants against his face and her hands loosen in his hair but she doesn’t disengage completely. 

“Fuck.” She whispers, and it’s the first time Stiles has ever heard her say that and it makes him laugh breathlessly. 

“Yeah.” He rasps, his voice several octaves deeper than he’s ever heard it. His lips are buzzing with sensation and he wants to dive back in but stops himself, needing at least a few more seconds to catch his breath. He opens his eyes, greeted with her shimmering face and stunningly green eyes and he drinks it all in. The feel of her against him, the tingling in his lips, the sound of her breathless laughter echoing his, everything being filed away. 

“That was…” She gasps and he laughs. 

“Yeah.” He agrees. 

“Is it always like this?” She asks, leaning back and looking up at him. He moves his hand so he can stroke his thumb across her cheekbone. 

“Is what?” 

She giggles, the sound light and happy, “This.” She gestures between them, pulling one hand out of his hair, “I’ve never felt anything like this, in this life or the one before it. I find it all very…”

“Intense?” He offers.

“Yes, intense is one word.” 

“I don’t know.” He tells her honestly, “I don’t have much…experience.” 

“Oh.” She says, seeming honestly surprised, “What about Heather?” 

Stiles laughs, leaning his forehead against hers. “Beyond fumbling in a closet in freshman year during seven minutes in heaven, no.” 

“Really?” Now she sounds disbelieving. 

Stiles chuckles. “Yes, Lydia, what do you want me to say?”

“I’m simply surprised.” She says, “That kiss…it doesn’t really reflect a novice.” Stiles flushes, the back of his neck and ear burning. 

“Oh, uhm,” He stutters, not knowing how he should respond to that. “Thanks?” 

“No, thank you.” She insists, her eyes shining with mischief as she smirks. A shudder runs up his spine. 

“You--you’re welcome.” He clears his throat. “You were--it was--you’re also really--” She giggles, cutting him off. 

“Thank you, Stiles.” Lydia says, grinning. Her grin widens as she steps back, Stiles relinquishing his hold reluctantly. “Do you want to see something else?” She asks coyly, but her grin gives her away. 

“Oh yes, absolutely.” Stiles says. Her grin turns sharp and wicked before she’s gone. Simply not there anymore, one second she was and now she’s not. He hears her laughter behind him and he whirls to find the source, only to see a flash of red between the trees and nothing else. He follows the direction it had been heading but he knows he won’t find her until she wants to be found. 

He grins. 

He hears a whistle above him and sees her standing gracefully on the tallest branch of the tallest tree on the outskirts of the meadow. He laughs up at her, delighted by the display of her inhumanness, both because of the trust she has to have in him to do it and because it is, by far, the coolest thing he’s ever seen. 

She spins and  _ dives  _ off the tree branch, her body sailing to the ground in a glittering streak before she grabs hold of another branch and uses it to swing into the next tree, leaving it swinging wildly behind her. She does acrobatic flips in the trees, weaving in and out of branches, arcing around the outskirts of the meadow with ease, like they were never there in the first place. Like she’s so familiar with their positions she could do it in her sleep. 

She launches herself from one of them and arcs over the meadow, right over Stiles head, her dress and her hair fluttering in the wind, her skin sparking in the sunlight. Lydia grabs the top of the tree and swings around it in circles before gracefully landing on one of the top-most branches, taking a bow. Stiles claps, throwing his head back and laughing. 

She dives from this one too and lands on the ground in a crouch more befitting of a cat than a girl. She runs to him, instantaneously in front of him and tugging him down by the collar of his flannel. 

This kiss is different than the last, quick and  _ mind-numbing _ , sending shocks all the way down his body. His hands gain a mind of their own and clutch at her dress, grabbing fistfuls as they kiss. But it’s over seconds after it starts and she’s pulling out of his hands with a smirk playing at her ridiculously kissable lips. 

Now that he’s started he has no idea how he’s supposed to stop if every kiss is supposed to feel like that. 

“What about strength, now that you’ve seen speed and agility?” She asks, her voice satisfyingly breathless. 

Stiles couldn’t form words after that even if he’d wanted to and just nods. She grins and flashes away, coming back with an actual boulder in one hand, lifting it as though it weighs nothing.

She grins at him and throws it across the meadow, knocking  _ through  _ two trees and making them topple over at the break. Before he can even flinch she’s back by his side. 

“How’s that?” She practically  _ simpers _ . Stiles grins down at her. 

“Fucking fantastic.” He says honestly, his grin huge and unrestrained and full of everything he hasn’t said yet. 

He loves her. It’s in the way she talks; the things she thinks about, how she thinks about them; in her love of lemons and science; in her natural inquisitiveness that doesn’t in any way overshadow her kindness. It’s in the kinds of questions she asks him, the way she asks them. It’s in the way she looks now, her hair windswept and tangled with a leaf stuck in the back, her lips red and grinning up at him, her eyes dancing with enthusiasm and recklessness. She’s heartbreakingly beautiful in every single way and it almost brings him to his knees. 

“Lydia,” He says.

She cocks her head at him, a silent question. 

“You’re beautiful. And gorgeous and stunning and the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.” He tells her honestly, “Thank you, for showing me all of this and just being…willing to be yourself around me.” He rubs the back of his neck and grins at her. 

Lydia smiles, soft and fond, her shining, ruby lips curving perfectly--completely unsurprisingly. “Thank you for indulging me.” She says, her eyes twinkling. She bites her lip as she looks up at him through her lashes and he almost dies on the spot. 

“It was absolutely my pleasure.” He tells her, his brain pushing the words forth without much consulting. 

She laughs, her face shining as she throws her head back. He doesn’t think much about it before swooping in and placing a soft kiss on her neck. Her breath catches in her throat and she gently holds onto the tops of his arms. She slowly pushes him back and when he looks up at him in confusion she’s not looking at him, she’s looking at his neck. 

“Lydia?” Stiles asks, for the first time feeling shudders of apprehension slowly skating up his spine, vertebrae by vertebrae. 

She tears her eyes away from his neck, from his pulse, and looks up at him, her pupils huge--almost completely enveloping the green.

“I’m sorry.” She gasps and flashes away, ten feet away from him in the time it takes him to blink. 

“It’s okay.” Stiles says, meaning it. “You wouldn’t hurt me.” 

“It’s not  _ okay _ .” She says miserably, “That was, was  _ completely  _ irresponsible of me, I’m so sorry Stiles, you can’t fathom how sorry I am.” 

“Lydia, I said it’s okay.” Stiles says, “You wouldn’t hurt me” He reasserts. 

“Stiles--”

“I mean it.” He insists. “Lydia, do you honestly think that if you _ actually _ wanted to hurt me, I’d be standing here right now?” She glares at him, and he can say with absolute certainty that if looks could kill, this one would. But he doesn’t back down. 

“No.” She grumbles, “But I _did_ want to.” She looks miserable, crossing her arms over her chest, curling into herself. 

“There’s a difference between wanting something and actually intending to take it.” He tells her. He sits on the ground, wanting to show her that he trusts her, that he’s comfortable with her. “You can desire something, know it’s wrong to take it, and stop yourself, and there’s  _ nothing wrong with that. _ ”

“Stiles you have  _ no idea  _ what you’re talking about.” Lydia insists, still glaring. 

“No.” He says honestly, “I don’t. I have no idea what’s going through your head right now, no idea how you managed to go against your instincts like that. But I know that you did, and that’s what matters.” 

“Oh is that all?” She spits. 

“Lydia you do this, this  _ thing  _ where you expect way too much of yourself all at once.” Stiles tells her and she looks like she’s been slapped. “This is completely new territory. You know how to live around humans, how to exist ear them without killing them but this isn’t like that. You’re closer to me than anyone else. That changes things.” 

“So it’s too much for me to expect I don’t attempt to kill you?” 

“Actually, yes.” He rubs a hand over his face, “You’re doing great, you’ve been doing great all day, hell the past  _ three  _ days. This is the first close call we’ve ever had and it wasn’t even that close.” 

“You have no idea how close it was.” Lydia almost sneers. 

“Okay, so, how close was it?” He asks. She startles, her eyes snapping to his, colored with horror. 

“Stiles I  _ could have killed you _ .” She breathes, “I knew exactly how to do it, I was so close, literally inches away.”

“For how long?” 

“What?” She asks, angry disbelief dripping from her voice. 

“How long were you actually considering it?” He asks, “I mean, genuinely considered it, planned out the aftermath, thought out what you were gonna say to my dad, to your family--”

“Stiles!” She suddenly shouts and her voice is frantic, “I didn’t--I never even--I hadn’t--” She struggles and Stiles stands, shoving his hands in his pockets. 

“I know you didn’t.” He tells her. “Now you do too.” 

“Stiles,  _ please _ tell me you didn’t do that on purpose.” She snaps. She seems to consider it a moment before walking back to him at a completely human pace.

“Not even remotely.” He says honestly, pouring as much sincerity into the words as he can, “I just wanted to kiss you.” She narrows her eyes at him. 

“Neck kisses are off limits.” She says, slicing a decisive hand through the air, and Stiles sighs in relief. 

“No neck kisses, then.” He agrees effortlessly. He can’t deny that he's a  _ little  _ disappointed, but it’s hardly even a sacrifice to make her feel more at ease with herself. 

Because that’s just it. Stiles trusts her. And maybe it’s stupid, or selfish, and it  _ is  _ straight up dangerous, but he does.  He operates on logic and observations and data and everything he knows about Lydia tells him that if she actually wanted to hurt him in any way she already would have. She’s had plenty of opportunity over the past few days and even before then to do so and she hadn’t. 

Maybe it’s reckless and idiotic to trust her so much--with his  _ life _ \--but it doesn’t change the fact that he does. And it’s so clear that she wouldn’t ever do anything like that, that she prides herself far too much on being level headed and logical to get so lost in something she doesn’t even  _ want  _ to give into. It would be one thing if she actually wanted to--really wanted to, not just the instinctual desire she can’t get rid of--but she doesn’t. She’s proven that over and over again. 

“It’s too…tempting.” She says and Stiles nods. 

“I get it.” He rubs the back of his head, “And I’m sorry, that I made it harder for you.” 

“You didn’t do it intentionally.” She allows and grabs his hand, presses it to her warm, glittering face. He cups her cheek and she leans into it. “And I’m sorry, that I…lost control.”

His eyebrows furrow. “You were in control the whole time. The second you caught yourself slipping you ran. That’s amazing and not at all something you should be ashamed of. It’s something you should be proud of.” 

“Well, I don’t know about that.” She mutters, “But you…seem to trust me. And I trust you. So I’ll trust that you believe that of me and we’ll leave it at that.” 

Stiles relents. He can recognize when he’s pushed enough on that. 

“Okay, so is there anything else I shouldn’t do?” He asks. 

“No.” Lydia says, looking up at him almost wistfully for a second. “No, there’s nothing more I can think of. But I promise to tell you if I do.” She squeezes the wrist of the hand on her cheek and he smiles at her.

“Okay.” 

“And if I,” She pauses, looks down at the ground, “If I do anything that scares you, or makes you feel unsafe, tell me immediately.” When she looks back up at him, her gaze is pleading. He wants to insist that it’s not necessary, that she could never do anything that would make him afraid of her. But for one thing, he doesn’t know that that’s true, and for another, it’s not about him. It’s assurance for her sake. 

“I promise.” Stiles says and he takes a step closer, watching her face for a sign that he’s not welcome right now. But there’s nothing. He takes another. 

He slowly brings his other hand up to the other side of her face. He smiles softly down at her and dips to kiss her forehead. 

“Can I kiss you again?” She asks and Stiles grins. 

“You don’t even have to  _ ask _ .” He insists and brings his lips down to hers. 

It’s soft and slow and achingly sweet. He pours everything he’s got into it and she responds in kind, her arms wrapping around his waist and reeling him in closer. 

“I’m never going to get tired of that.” She breathes when they break apart. 

“Good.” Stiles says and she giggles. 

The rest of the afternoon plays out in similar fashion, Lydia showing off at every opportunity and grinning at him when he laughs at her displays, him marvelling at everything about her, and the beauty of the meadow being eclipsed by her. 

They kiss a few more times, and he never gets used to the feeling of her lips moving against his, her hands in his hair or on his arms or his shoulders. 

Once the sun starts to lengthen the shadows of the trees around them Lydia sighs. 

“I should probably make sure you get home at a reasonable hour.” She complains and he laughs from his place next to her on the grass, laying on his back while she sits up and plays with his fingers. 

“We still have time.” He insists. With her speed and apparent  _ night vision _ they’ll have no trouble getting back to his car with time plenty of time to spare. 

“You’re a terrible influence.” She teases and he grins up at her. But she’d not wrong. Once the sun sets it will be too cold for him to stay out too much longer. He’s already starting to feel chilly. 

And actually kind of hungry. He hadn’t actually thought about that one little detail and he was regretting it now. 

“Can I--” Stiles pauses, knowing he wants to ask this question, hell,  _ needs _ to ask it, but terrified of the answer. But he pushed forward, compelled by his parents instillment of  _ be safe  _ to ask. “Can I ask you a question that’s decidedly not first date appropriate but necessary for our particular…arrangement?” He winces at his wording. He made it sound like a business deal. He looks over at her and she laughs. 

“Of course.” 

Now Stiles doesn’t know where to start. 

“Okay, so.” He huffs, frustrated with his own inability to use words effectively. “Earlier you said that you were new to all of this and you were surprised when I wasn’t and I guess I just want to know, like, okay, so here’s the thing. I’m just a regular, human guy and you’re like ridiculously beautiful and I’m  _ insanely  _ attracted to you but I’m not sure how that translates, for you. I mean, you told me you found me attractive but how is that different, vampire to human? What does, like, desire look like for vampires?” 

The corners of Lydia’s lips twitch. “Stiles, are you asking me about sex?” 

He covers his face with both of his hands, ripping the one that was in hers back. 

“Yes.” He mutters to his palms. She giggles. 

“You’re right, not very first date material.” She chides lightly, “But yes, altogether necessary.” 

“Okay?” 

She hums thoughtfully. “I’m not a very good authority on this.” She admits and he peeks through his fingers at her. She grins at him and gently takes his hand back. She holds it between hers and traces the lines on his palms.

“How do you mean?” He asks, knowing but not really  _ knowing  _ and, all things considered, this is something he should  _ know. _

Lydia smiles softly down at him, looking maybe a little embarrassed. “I mean that I haven’t…as a vampire. I’m…unfamiliar with the mechanics. And, even if I were, we face a challenge that even the people I’ve asked couldn’t really help with.” 

Stiles shoots upright.

“Wait, you’ve  _ asked _ ?” He asks, almost horrified. 

She rolls her eyes.”Of course I asked, Stiles.” 

“Presumptuous.” He half heartedly chastises but he can feel the flush darkening his cheeks and he knows she can see it too. She giggles. 

“Perhaps.” She allows, “But I wanted to be safer, rather than sorry, don’t you agree?” 

Well, yeah, generally he does. It’s why he’s carried a condom in his wallet since his mom gave him a box for  _ better safe than sorry  _ reasons and he’s honestly not even sure if it’s still good. Probably not.  

Would they even need--?  _ Nope, do not go down that road, that road leads to madness, start here. _ His brain commands and Stiles is  _ more  _ than happy to oblige. 

“Yeah.” He allows and cringes, “Who did you ask?” 

“Allison and Isaac.” She says and Stiles squeezes his eyes shut. 

“And what did you ask them?” He asks and she’s biting back a smile when he opens his eyes. 

“I wanted to know how it compared.” She says, “Human to vampire, what changed. I…” She hesitates, darting a cautious look over at him. 

“It’s okay,” He insists, “It’s hardly fair for me to expect anybody I got into a relationship with to be a virgin, much less someone older than me.” 

“Well, I wasn’t supposed to…well I’m sure you already know what I wasn’t supposed to do.” She mumbles and Stiles almost smiles at how human she seems when she stumbles over her words. 

He shrugs. “It’s okay.” He says again. She seems kinda wary of that, but continues nonetheless. 

“Well, anyways, I wanted to know if the…intensity went up. If it was…physically…different.” She struggles and Stiles tries very hard to bite back a smile. “I had to ask Victoria as well, for the…physical aspects.” Stiles is sure if she could blush she would. 

“So, what did you find out?” He asks. He tries not to feel embarrassed or even nervous about this, because he knows it’s important. 

Not only that, he actually  _ wants  _ to do that with her. Like.  _ A lot. _

“Allison, when she was human, was married. She had the experience that I didn’t and on top of that, she and Isaac fell for each other essentially the moment they met. The way she described it was that she still has human desires, but they're…sharper, in a way. The insistence is there to a higher degree than for humans, is what she would say.” She explains. 

“Okay, so that was unhelpful?” 

“No, not necessarily, it’s just not as helpful as I need it to be.” Lydia elaborates, “With you, with  _ us _ , I have to fight my own instincts. To a certain degree I do it every moment we’re together, and certain instances are harder than others.” Her fingers brush over his cheeks and down his neck, sending shudders through seemingly every nerve ending. “I do love that.” She adds, her pointer finger lightly tapping the side of his neck where a flush is steadily rising. 

“So, is it off the table for us?” He bites the bullet. She winces. 

“I don’t know.” She admits. “I know that I won’t hurt you, but that’s without distraction, without…” Her breath goes shaky, “Without seeing what you look like, what this,” She taps his neck again, “Looks like in more…compromising instances.” She smiles shyly at him and he swears to every deity that he dies on the spot. 

He’d known, of course, that he  _ appealed _ to her--the night after he’d found out the truth still fresh in his mind--but to have it confirmed so doubtlessly is…a lot. He goes a little light headed. 

“Okay.” He says. He doesn’t know what else he  _ can  _ say. “I get that.” 

“But,” She starts, smirking at him, “That doesn’t mean it’s impossible and we won’t know until we…try.” She bites her lip, her eyes flicking down to his lips and back up to his eyes. Stiles thinks he might actually pass out and has to remind himself to breathe. He takes a huge, gasping breath, wishing his body didn’t _react_ to her so much. He’s really not wearing the right pants right now. 

“But not yet.” Stiles says, both because he knows it’s true and because he’s _way_ not ready for all of that. Insecurities about performance  _ aside  _ he’s been dating her a solid three days and has known her for approximately three months, six weeks of which she was avoiding him. 

“No.” She agrees, her smile soft and sweet, making it less like a rejection because it’s  _ not  _ a rejection. They have time. 

Lots of time. 

“Good to know.” Stiles says. 

“Agreed.” She chuckles. 

He looks back up at the sky to see it growing steadily pinker and sighs. 

“We should probably go.” He says and she pouts. He can’t help leaning forward and stealing her pouting lips in a kiss. She responds in kind, and completely unexpectedly. 

She climbs into his lap and he rests his weight on an arm behind him as he makes a surprised noise in the back of his throat. She only hums in response, her lips sliding against his and her fingers buried in his hair. His free hand lands on her waist after trying to make a detour to her thigh, which Stiles shut down before it could start. She bites at his bottom lip and his fingers tighten against her skin, hiking her dress up further. 

His hand seemingly gains a mind of its own because it starts steadily tracking its way down to her thigh, moving over her hip and waiting to be told off. When it isn’t, Stiles far too distracted with her tongue dragging across his bottom lip in a way that makes him fucking  _ ache  _ with want, it slides down the length of her dress and settles just below the hem at about mid thigh. 

It flexes against the soft, over-warm skin when she tugs gently at his hair. He can’t help the soft sound that leaves him at that. She giggles against his lips and leans back to stare down at him, her lips swollen and her eyes dark. 

“You will be the end of me.” He tells her, his voice a few octaves too low and she actually fucking  _ shivers. _

“That would be a shame.” Lydia says breathlessly. “I’m having far too much fun to end it now.” She pouts again and he can tell from the look in her eyes that she knows exactly what she’s doing. He leans up to kiss her again but she stops him with a finger against his own kiss-swollen lips. 

“I should get you home.” She whispers and Stiles groans, leaning his head against her shoulder. 

“Why must you be so responsible?” He bemoans and she chuckles. 

“I’m trying to make a good impression.” She reminds him and he groans again. He takes another couple of seconds to try and reassemble his brain before looking up. 

She grins and he grins back, his smile probably looking ridiculously dopey. But hers does too. 

Lydia stands and actually does a fucking  _ cartwheel  _ or some other kind of tumbling move and lands with a hand held out to him. He glares at her but takes the offered hand and just goes with it when she positions herself for their run back; he climbs on with much less pride-swallowing this time. 

The drive back to his house is quiet, the radio weaving through the comfortable silence between them. She has his hand in her lap, still tracing the lines with her fingertips and sending chills running pleasantly up and down his spine. 

“I had a good time today.” She says and Stiles smiles over at her as they pull onto his street. 

“I did too. Thank you, for taking me there and showing me who you are.” He tells her honestly. She smiles softly at him. 

“You’re welcome. Thank you for trusting me.” She bites her lip and flashes him a somewhat guilty smile. He smiles back. 

He pulls into his driveway and turns to her. 

“I should go.” He sighs, wishing he didn’t. 

“As should I.” Lydia grins wryly at him, “I have much teasing to weather through.” 

Stiles laughs. “Yeah, I’m sure I do too.” 

“Would you still want to see me tomorrow?” She asks and he can’t agree fast enough, nodding enthusiastically. She giggles. “I’d like you to meet my family, officially.” 

“I’ve met a few of them.” He points out and she chuckles. 

“I mean I want you to meet them as my boyfriend.” Lydia elaborates, rolling her eyes. The grin that spreads across his face practically breaks it in half and she grins back. 

“I’d love to.” He tells her honestly, actually looking forward to the opportunity. 

“Good. I’ll pick you up here in the morning, does nine sound alright to you?” She asks and Stiles wants to say no, wants her to come earlier, but he can’t deny having a few hours to process everything is something he really needs.

“Nine is good.” He leans forward and presses a chaste kiss on her lips. She chases his lips down when he breaks apart, places two more softly sweet kisses there before smiling and getting out of his car. 

Stiles hugs her before she gets in her car, kissing the side of her head and she giggles. 

“Goodnight, Stiles.” 

“Goodnight, Lydia.” 

As she drives away that night he bites his lip and watches her car until he can’t see it around the bend. 

“Night.” He murmurs to the darkening street and heads inside. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so much for hits and kudos, they truly mean the world to me. and let me just say, i'm so glad the slow burn is over cuz it's only been like a month and a half for you guys but i've been working on this since FEBRUARY so this is like straight heroin for me rn and i'm having a great time. more kisses and lore and stories to come! we're gettin there!


	13. As We Walk in the Dimming Light; My Darling Understand

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...i don't have an explanation for this other than smeyer let us down and this is way more fun and also we stan communication. also i just want them to kiss more. so here you go! 6k words of pure self-indulgence that you guys signed up for (for some reason) and i'm literally infinitely grateful that you guys did. thanks for kudos and hits and comments, they make my day. 
> 
> i will have this done by october, so help me god, because after that i start my online class and i won't have any time to speak of to work on this--which will be tragic.

The next day, Stiles wakes up way earlier than he has to, the sun streaming through the window above his bed and waking him up prematurely. He glares at it blearily and rolls over but it doesn’t take long for the events of the day before to catch up with him. 

He’d  _ kissed Lydia _ . Actually, for real, kissed her. And she’d kissed him back. And said he was good at it, even said ‘fuck’ after their first kiss. He grins into his pillow like the lovesick fool he is and rolls onto his back. 

He picks his phone up and blinks the sleep away while he reads over the text he has from Heather, sent at 2:34 in the morning.

_ Hey kid, how was your week? Oh good? Great cuz now i need to bitch ok so you know how that guy in my gym class was totally flirting with me? Yeah so guess what? He has a girlfriend and was totally full of shit.  _

Stiles snorts and crafts his response.

_ Total bullshit. That sucks. His loss. _

He hoists himself out of bed and brushes his teeth and runs a hand over his hair. It’s kind of a disaster but there’s not much he can do about it. Stiles stares at his dresser and the lack of good clothes within it. Now it’s even worse, because he’s meeting her family today, and he has no idea what to wear. 

He’s fairly certain Lydia would tell him not to worry about it, but that doesn’t mean he actually won’t. He’s hardwired for worrying.  

Eventually he sighs heavily and pulls on jeans--making sure there aren’t any holes--and a black tee shirt with his customary flannel--this one dark red and grey.  

He makes himself breakfast and glances at the oven clock. 7:43 and he has over an hour to fill. He decides it’s probably a good idea to get some homework done since he’s been so thoroughly distracted by Lydia for the last week and a half. And finals aren’t all that far away and he  _ does  _ actually want to graduate high school.

Stiles checks his phone again to see Heather’s texted back. 

_ Yo, do you know if that one guy we saw at the diner is single? And looking? Cuz im single and im definitely looking and if he wants to look in my general direction i wont complain.  _

Stiles laughs down at his phone and his father walks sleepily into the kitchen. 

“Wha’s funny?” He mumbles and Stiles snorts at him and his slurring. 

“Heather.” 

“Ah.” His dad goes rooting through the fridge for food and Stiles leans against the counter, munching on his toast. 

_ He’s single. _ Stiles tells her, but he’s not actually sure if that’s a good idea what with Jackson being a vampire and the adoptive brother of his girlfriend.  _ But he’s here and you’re there. And he’s kind of an asshole.  _

_ I dont care, with cheekbones like that he can be an asshole all he likes. I dont need him to talk i just wanna look at him. _

Stiles chuckles.  _ Solid basis for a relationship, that.  _

_ I know, im just made of stable choices. _

Stiles sends her the U.F.O. emoji and she comes back with the crystal ball. As is customary. 

_ I’m going on a date with Lydia today. _ He drops on Heather and isn’t all that surprised when she comes back with a string of emojis and punctuation that all conveys ‘shock’ to him. He chuckles down at his phone, grinning. 

_ Thats awesome! Im not even there to give the shovel talk! Shit!! _

He snorts at her.  _ You’ll have a chance, I’m sure. She’s gonna be around a while. _ Stiles admits and he can practically  _ feel  _ her glee eleven hours away.

_ Thats awesome stiles, i told you, didnt i tell you??? _

_ You told me.  _ He assures her,  _ We kissed yesterday. _

_!!!!MAH BOY!!!! _

This time Stiles outright laughs, resting his forehead on the kitchen table.

_ Don’t get too excited, it was just a kiss. _

_ Just a kiss??? Uh, no, its not just a kiss, its your first kiss! _

_ Actually you were my first kiss.  _ He reminds her. 

_ I dont count asshole im basically a female version of you.  _ Heather insists and Stiles laughs. 

_ I like to think I’m at least slightly more refined than you. _

_ Thats because you are. And you shouldnt be all that proud of that, i set the bar real low. _

Stiles snorts at her. 

_ I’m meeting her parents today. _

_ Sounds serious.  _ She sends back, but he can practically see her waggling her eyebrows at him. 

_ How did you make two words sound so dirty from 800 miles away? _

_ It is a *skill* stilinski, one that I have been cultivating for years.  _ She responds and he grins.

_ My point is that I’m probably gonna be MIA for the day because of that.  _

_ You better tell me everything that happens, and I do want details. _

_ Ew.  _ He insists and she sends the devil emoji. 

_ Tell Cheekbones I said hi.  _ She requests and he rolls his eyes. 

_ I absolutely will not. _

_ Shame.  _ She attaches the middle finger emoji and after sending one back he sets his phone down and starts to struggle through calculus homework. He actually loses track of time before looking up and seeing it’s already 8:49. His heart jumps into his throat and he can’t help grinning. 

He might get to kiss her again today. 

“What’s with the smile?” His dad asks, dressed in his uniform and leaning against the counter with coffee in hand. 

“Lydia’s gonna be here soon.” 

“Hanging out again?” 

Stiles nods, packing up his unfinished homework. “Gonna meet her parents today.” 

His dad raises his eyebrows. “Sounds serious.” 

Stiles shrugs. “I mean, she does still live with them, it was bound to happen one way or another.” His dad snorts. 

“Okay, fair point.” 

“I’m full of those.” Stiles points out and his dad raises his mug in a cheers motion. Stiles salutes with his pen before tucking it into his backpack. 

There’s a delicate knock at the door and Stiles almost faceplants in his haste to get up and answer it. 

Lydia is standing in the shade of his porch with her hood up. She smiles wryly at him as he takes in her skin covering outfit of light jeans, wine-coloured turtle neck, and the same hooded jacket from a few days ago. 

He invites her inside and she’s careful to step around the patches of sunlight cast by their open windows. She tosses her hood back and she looks…brighter than usual but certainly not sparkling like the day before. If Stiles didn’t know what the actual reason was he’d probably write it off as a trick of the light, a particularly good angle, or even a good mood. It’s too understated to be of much concern, as long as she doesn’t step directly into the sunlight. 

“Hello, Lydia.” His dad greets and Lydia breaks into a winning smile. 

“Good morning, Sheriff Stilinski. How are you?” She asks, her voice and body language genuine. His dad clears his throat under the attention and Stiles stifles a smile.

“Just fine, Lydia, and yourself? And please, just call me Noah.” 

“Peachy keen,  _ Noah. _ ” She grins and Stiles wants to press a kiss to her forehead because  _ fuck that was so cute,  _ but he lets it go. He’s not sure how his dad would react to that and he’s not super inclined to find out. 

“Glad to hear it. Stiles said he’s gonna meet your parents today?” 

“Yes, that’s precisely what we’re planning on today. He may also be joining us for a game this evening,” She turns to Stiles and dimples at him, “If he’s willing, of course.” 

Stiles melts under her green gaze, as he always does, and nods dazedly. 

“Excellent.” She grins up at him and Stiles tries to keep his breath in his lungs where it belongs. 

“Well, I won’t keep you two. Be safe.” His dad interrupts and Stiles blinks and looks up at him, his brain taking just a second too long to compute. 

“Can do.” Stiles says belatedly and Lydia giggles, sharing a conspiratorial look with his dad and he shoots her a glare without any semblance of heat. It’s lukewarm at best.

“Goodbye, Noah.” Lydia says sweetly and his dad beams at her. 

“Have a good day, you two.” He replies and Stiles shoots off a sloppy salute as he follows Lydia out.

The drive to her house is peaceful, music playing softly through the comfortable car, the engine so quiet compared to Stiles’ jeep he would’ve been unnerved if it weren’t for the music and Lydia, sitting next to him, and holding his hand. She’d occasionally stroke her thumb along the outside of his and everytime he would almost sigh. 

It takes about twenty minutes to get to her house going roughly eighty miles an hour the whole way there and yet Stiles is still drowsy by the time they slow to a stop in her driveway. 

“Woah.” He whispers, looking up at the enormous house. 

It is, admittedly, not what he was expecting. Although, he’s not entirely sure  _ what  _ he’d been expecting, but it hadn’t been wide and wood panelled and  _ open  _ to the whole forest. It seems like every wall is a window where it’s structurally sound to do so. The house itself is lifted off the ground a few feet by massive steel support beams that manage to match the aesthetic of the rest of the house with its concrete porch and geometric layout. It is, above all else, stunningly unique and beautiful in a way Stiles wouldn’t have guessed at. 

“It’s so…” He flounders, at a loss for words. 

“Open?” Lydia offers and Stiles laughs. 

“Yeah.” He agrees, mostly because he’s not sure how else he’d describe it. 

“Yes, well, this  _ is _ the one place we don’t have to hide. And the sunny days are so rare for us, why not enjoy them to the fullest?” She shrugs elegantly but something tells Stiles this is a big deal to her. 

He laces their fingers together and leans down to kiss her forehead. Her hood drops down and he’s momentarily blinded by her glittering features, but once his eyes have adjusted to the change he grins down at her and kisses her head again. She smiles softly, an expression he’d probably call ‘besotted’. 

“Ready?” She asks and he inhales deeply before exhaling slowly, bracing himself. 

“Yes.” Stiles says decisively and she squeezes his hand. 

Lydia leads him inside, basically hopping up the steps leading into the house, her hair bouncing behind her and Stiles chuckles. When she turns questioning eyes on him he gently tugs one of her curls and she makes a face at him, whipping her hair out of the way. He laughs while she pulls open the front door. 

He turns and standing next to the stairs are two people, statue still. One of them Stiles has met before. 

“Dr. Argent.” He greets, a smile stretching across his face. Dr. Argent returns it, and it even looks warm despite the somewhat chilling quality of her light blue eyes. They’re just as vibrant as Lydia’s in their own way. While Lydia’s are springtime and meadows and life, Dr. Argent’s are glacial, the kind of blue you see looking down into one of those icy, jagged ravines in Antarctica. 

The man is the only Argent Stiles hasn’t met. He knows his name is Chris, though it’s somewhat tangential knowledge. This man is…calming, in a way Stiles can’t really describe. Maybe it’s the way he carries himself, self-assured and confident. Not cocky, just…grounded. His features are just as preternaturally beautiful as the rest of them, though he looks almost rugged with his facial hair and dusty blond hair that’s slightly greying. Stiles imagines it must have been greying when he’d been turned. 

“Lovely to see you again, Stiles. Though I’m sure the circumstances are preferable.” Dr. Argent says, her lips pulled into a small but genuine smile. She doesn’t seem like the kind of woman to smile much, but he imagines that it’s all the more important when she does. “And please, Victoria is fine.” She insists.

“It’s nice to see you again, Victoria.” He responds, and it feels way too informal to call her Victoria, but she  _ did  _ ask him to.

“My name is Chris,” Chris greets and Stiles turns to the man, “I’m Lydia’s, well, father, in a manner of speaking.” He says with a wry tilt to his mouth and Stiles surprises himself by laughing. 

“It’s nice to meet you.” Stiles says, and he actually means it. These are Lydia’s parents, for all intents and purposes. They’d been her parents a whole lot longer than her biological ones had, and beyond that, they genuinely care about her. That’s more than enough, in Stiles’ opinion. 

“And you, Stiles. We’ve heard so much about you.” He beams and Stiles’ neck heats up. 

“Dad.” Lydia says, in the most elegant and refined  _ whine _ Stiles thinks he’s ever heard. 

“All good, Stiles, don’t worry.” Victoria says, smiling warmly at her daughter. Stiles smiles too, loving the warm affection in Victoria’s face, in Chris’ smile as they regard their daughter. After hearing a snippet of what her life was like before, he’s infinitely glad she has this now. 

“That’s good.” He says and Chris and Victoria continue to smile warmly at him and he feels awkward, like something is out of place with this meeting and it takes him a moment to realise they hadn’t offered their hands for him to shake. It makes sense that they hadn’t, had wanted to keep their distance either for their benefit or his, he doesn’t know for sure, but he gets it. Lydia sighs.  

“Where are Allison and Isaac?” She asks and as if on cue--actually, probably exactly on cue, because they’re vampires--Isaac literally falls from the top of the stairs over the banister to the first floor. Stiles jumps and tries not to shriek. It had been so fast Stiles hadn’t even  _ seen it. _

“Stiles!” Isaac declares, as though Stiles is the most exciting person on the planet. 

“Hi.” Stiles answers, stunned. Isaac grins wolfishly--which reminds Stiles of Erica Reyes, oddly--and darts forward too fast to see, enveloping Stiles in a hug, slapping him  _ very _ gently on the back. Stiles responds somewhat belatedly, offering a few weak pats in return. 

“It’s good to see you.” Isaac says genuinely. Stiles can’t help but smile in response, Isaac’s excitement is so infectious. 

“Uh, you too.” Stiles responds, unsure how exactly he  _ should  _ be responding. Isaac laughs. 

“It’s okay, you’re not there yet. But you will be.” He explains confidently and though Stiles still feels like he’s a few steps behind he takes comfort in the fact that he’s not being immediately expected to form attachments to people he hasn’t really interacted with all that much. 

Allison makes her entrance, albeit a little less showy and slightly slower, but it’s still far too quick and graceful to be human. 

“Good morning, Stiles.” She says sweetly and holds out her hand. Stiles takes it, grateful to finally have some semblance of normalcy in this interaction again. 

“Morning.” He responds and releases her hand. She flexes her fingers staring down at them in wonder. 

“Oh, that  _ is  _ different, isn’t it?” She mumbles to herself and Lydia laughs. 

“Like cold glass.” Lydia says and Allison snaps her head up and grins at Lydia. 

“ _ Exactly  _ like cold glass.” She agrees, giggling and Stiles blushes all the way to the roots of his hair. 

“Where’s Jackson?” Lydia asks and Allison rolls her eyes. 

“Skulking.” She sniffs. Isaac laughs and Chris does a very poor job of hiding his chuckle. Victoria smacks him, hard enough Stiles is sure if Chris had been human it would’ve bruised. 

“I don’t skulk.” A superior voice says behind Stiles and he jumps again, spinning around so fast Lydia and Isaac both move forward to steady him. He flushes again. 

“You  _ literally  _ just skulked.” Stiles says before he can help himself and Lydia bursts into laughter so hard she has to hang onto Stiles to keep herself upright. 

Jackson levels Stiles with a look that could probably peel paint and it makes Stiles feel like a bug on the bottom of Jackson’s shoe, but then Jackson smirks and some of the edge is taken off the expression. It’s still far too sharp for Stiles’ tastes but at least it looks less like he might kill Stiles at any moment.

He remembers his conversation with Heather this morning and almost shudders, Yeah, he wants his entirely too human and too mouthy best friend as far away from Jackson as he can get her.  _ Though, _ a small voice in the back of his head starts,  _ it would be fun to watch her knock his ass to the ground.  _

Stiles is hard-pressed to disagree. His fingers itch to text something along those lines to Heather but he refrains. At least for now.

“Come on,” Lydia says next to him and he looks down at her, “I’ll show you the rest of the house.” 

“Okay.” Stiles agrees, probably a little too quickly to be polite but can he really be blamed? He just met a whole bunch of vampires and only one of those interactions had been even slightly normal and he’d  _ already met  _ Victoria. It basically didn’t count. 

She takes his hand and leads him up the stairs. 

“I’m sorry,” She starts, “For…them.” She flaps her free hand through the air vaguely, encompassing the entire experience Stiles just had. He snorts. 

“Family’s like that.” Stiles says and Lydia laughs. 

“Yes, well, they’re normally far more well behaved than that.” She insists, “You pose a particularly…interesting issue for them. They want to like you for me, but they also want to genuinely like you, and in almost equal measure they fear you. Oh, not because of anything you did,” She quickly reassures him and he wonders what the hell his face had been doing, “But simply because you’re not one of us. That’s inherently dangerous, to our secret, our way of life.” 

“But I would never--”

“Of course you wouldn’t.” She says, stopping in front of a doorway, “But that’s hardly the point, is it? Fear isn’t always rational. Chris and Victoria’s office.” Lydia points at the doorway and Stiles peers in to see two large, expensive-looking desks opposite each other with various things strewn across their surfaces. Papers and books and paperweights with pens and pencils, even a few fountain pens. Stiles feels somewhat like he’s intruding and follows Lydia down the hall.

“Fair enough.” He says.

 She points out Allison and Isaac’s room next, then Jackson’s room, Chris and Victoria’s and then finally they stop at the end of the hall. 

“My room.” She says brightly, but Stiles can tell she’s…nervous to show him. He smiles encouragingly at her and she opens the door. 

His first thought is that it suits her incredibly well. The walls are white with various paintings hung up, seemingly haphazardly, but when he looks again they’ve got a kind of _ movement _ between them, like their placements tell some kind of story. He wonders where they all came from, how old they are, who painted them? He’ll have to ask at some point. 

There’s a standing piano against the wall to the right of the door, opposite a wall of windows that are bordered on all sides by bookshelves, and it’s a truly beautiful thing. The deep brown wood of the piano is old and worn, the keys chipped in places, and it’s so obviously well-loved. Carved flowers slope along the edges, meeting each other along the sides and front, the legs wrapped in wooden vines. It seems to  _ breathe  _ with life like only well-loved and lived-with things do. Stiles’ bookshelf is the same way, with knick knacks littering the shelves in front of books from every period of his life with an organization system that only makes sense to him. 

Lydia’s entire room is like that, Stiles realises. It’s organized and clean, yes, but it’s far from sterile. It’s warm, with reds and browns and pinks and oranges scattered throughout. There’s a couch adjacent the piano, on the same wall as the door; a deep, warm grey fabric with a red, knitted throw blanket draped over the back and white, orange, and yellow pillows arranged on it. There are two squished into one corner where Stiles can so clearly picture her sitting and reading, her face lit up by the sun, her eyes scanning the page, brows furrowed in concentration. There’s a book on the coffee table in front of it and Stiles is pretty sure it’s a book of poems he thinks he recognizes, but he’s not sure. 

Her bed faces the door, the windows throwing sunlight across the sheets. Stiles doesn’t actually know if she sleeps, hadn’t thought to ask, but he supposes there’s more than one reason to have a bed. Familiarity being one of them, a place of rest and comfort, warmth even if one was a vampire and rarely susceptible to cold. There are other things he can think of that would make one want a bed if not necessarily to sleep in it but he wrenches his brain away from that particular train of thought. 

It’s a four-poster bed, the frame made from a rich-coloured wood similar to the piano that's even carved similarly. Flowers and vines weave around the posts and across the foot board in a circular shape that looks kind of like a frame encircling a carved bouquet. Her sheets are a deep red, covered by a cream-coloured, lacy comforter and soft, squishy-looking pillows; each a different shade of sunset, or autumn leaves, depending on how one looked at them. There are matching night tables on either side, one of them obviously used more with a clock and a book with a worn bookmark sticking out of it placed on the surface. 

Her room is so personal, so well-suited to her, Stiles understands why she had been hesitant to show it to him. It’s intimate, in a way, for him to see her room, because it looks kind of like her soul has covered the space. 

It’s melodramatic, sure, but it’s not inaccurate. 

“Lydia.” He breathes, unsure of what to say, how to fill the tense silence that had stretched between them while he’d been taking it all in. 

He tries again, “Lydia this is…” He falters and huffs, “It’s so  _ you,  _ and it’s so beautiful.” Lydia studies him, possibly looking for the joke or the lie or something else equally as unlikely. 

“Thank you.” She mutters, still so unsure. Stiles wants to know who made her feel like her space wasn’t hers to do with as she pleased. 

But, then again, maybe he already does. She was going to get married in the 40s, was probably going to have a house she had no hand in changing or decorating. Maybe her love of music and books and comfort had been ridiculed at some point. Stiles isn’t normally a violent person, but he suddenly wants to hurt anyone who ever thought they could tell Lydia who or what she could be, what she could do. They didn’t deserve to have her in their lives. 

But he’s the one here in her bedroom, looking at her like she hung the moon because--as far as he’s concerned--she did. And that’s what matters. 

“Where did you get all these?” Stiles asks, pointing to the line of paintings and other works of art on the walls. Now that he’s looked closer, he can tell they’re going in a sort of wave across her bedroom, but it’s diffuse enough that if he hadn’t been looking for a pattern, he wouldn’t have found it. His eyes follow the movement of the pieces, tries to look for the story they’re telling. 

“Here and there.” Lydia says noncommittally, but she seems to be warming up, uncrossing her arms and clasping them behind her back instead. 

“How long have you been collecting?” Stiles tries again and she finally smiles. 

“Do you really want to know the story?” She asks and Stiles grins. 

“Obviously.” 

Lydia rolls her eyes at him but gestures to the couch and he sits. She stays standing and walks over to where Stiles had thought the end of the wave was, not the beginning. 

“It started with this one.” She says, touching the frame with the very tips of her fingers. It’s abstract, a splash of warm tones on a black background. “If you had asked me why I picked it, at the time, I don’t think I’d have known the answer.” He notices that the colours in the painting match the ones all over her room. 

In fact, at least one focal shade in each of the pieces is a warm tone, and he finally figures out what the story they’re telling is. 

Her story. 

“When I was…new to this life, we had moved to upstate New York for the winter. We weren’t going to stay long, it wouldn’t be possible once it started to get warmer. But Victoria and Chris wanted me to have experiences, wanted me to see the world like I hadn’t been able to, before. 

“They took me to museums and the Central Park Zoo and restaurants and Time’s Square. There was one gallery, nestled between a jewelry shop and a cafe upstate that had this in the window.” She looks back up at it, a fond expression on her face. “I didn’t even think about it before I bought it. Victoria never objected, never would have, money was never a problem for them after Isaac joined them in the 1860s.” Stiles wants to interrupt her, figure out more about that little tidbit of information, but he doesn’t want her to stop telling him this story about herself, “It was the first thing I’d actually wanted for myself at that point. And it had been more then half a decade since I’d been turned. It was a difficult transition in a lot of ways.” Her expression goes distant for a minute. 

“Why that one?” Stiles asks, wanting desperately to know more about this amazing woman and the life she’d led before he met her. 

Lydia shakes herself and smiles softly. “Like I said, at the time I had no idea. It just…shouted at me, from across the street.” She laughs at herself, “Perhaps that’s a touch dramatic, but as a metaphor it serves. I couldn’t walk away without it.

“But now I understand, with time and perspective and a healthy dose of art education, it was so different from anything I’d seen up until that point. All the art in the house of my childhood was for show, every painting looked the same; the same pastel shades and landscapes and technique heavy pieces. They had no feeling, no  _ spark  _ to them. But this,” She lays her fingers over the frame again, “This has feeling. It tells you exactly how it feels, what it’s meant to be saying, what you should be feeling and yet it allows you to feel how you feel in the spaces it leaves. It’s bright and full of life and colour in a way I had felt I wasn’t, even before my life as a human had ended.” 

She looks back over at him, gauging his reaction. 

He grins. “I’ll admit, I don’t know anything about art, but the way you talk about it is so…” He struggles to find the right words, “Full of love and knowledge. You just, really know what you’re talking about. I like that.” He tells her honestly. She ducks her head. 

“Oh I wouldn’t say I know what I’m talking about exactly, I just…found something new to look into. And once I found out how much science was involved in art, well, I’d found one more thing to love.” She shrugs, but it’s a little stiff, like she’s nervous about how she’ll be received. 

“Lydia, that’s so cool.” Stiles tells her, grinning ear to ear. She looks up at him and can’t help grinning back, though she puts forth her best effort. She’s suddenly right in front of him, standing between his legs and laying her hands on his shoulders. 

“You’re incredible, Stiles Stilinski.” She says, her eyes intense and holding onto his, “Did you know that?” She whispers as her face inches closer to his. 

“I figure I have to be at least a little interesting to land a dime like you.” Stiles says, grinning recklessly, and Lydia throws back her head and laughs. 

“You’re ridiculous.” She tells him breathlessly through bouts of giggles and Stiles laughs with her, feeling warmth in his chest and lightness in his limbs. 

He  _ loves  _ her.  

“I live only to entertain.” 

Lydia snorts delicately. 

“Yes, you’re very good at it.” 

“Thank you.” Stiles says, grinning. He wants to take a sarcastic bow but suddenly his lap is full of Lydia and her mouth is on his and he can’t think about anything else. 

Her lips are warm and slide against his like they were made to, soft and inviting. His hands land on her waist and she hums against his lips. He shudders. Her hands find their way into his hair and she gently scratches against his scalp and he can’t help the soft groan in the back of his throat. 

Lydia’s lips leave his for a second and he inhales fully for the first time in…well, he doesn’t actually know. 

“If I’m going to keep kissing you, you have to promise to breath normally.” She scolds him, but it loses any and all affect with her straddling him, her sweater pushed up by his hands, her cheeks flushed and her pupils blown wide. 

He grins. “Okay. I promise.” 

She scowls down at him, like she doesn’t believe for a second that he actually intends to keep his word. 

“To be fair,” He interjects, “That’s a somewhat unrealistic request.”

“That you continue to breathe?” Lydia asks, her voice dripping with incredulity. Stiles can’t stop the grin splitting his face. 

“While you’re kissing me? Yes.” 

“Then perhaps we’ll have to put that activity on the shelf for now.” She says loftily, pulling away from him. His hands hold tighter to her waist and she pauses. If she actually wanted to leave, his human hands wouldn’t be able to stop her, no matter how much he may want them to. He’s encouraged by this. 

“I promise to be good?” He offers. She huffs a laugh and drops a soft kiss on his lips. He chases after her when she breaks away but she removes herself from his lap. He can’t stifle the disappointed noise and she giggles. 

“Did you want to know more about my art collection?” Lydia teases and Stiles stands on somewhat wobbly legs, but he gets them working quickly. 

“Maybe later.” He allows, because he actually  _ does  _ want to know more about her art collection but he wants something else more. 

“I could always make you listen.” Lydia reminds him playfully. 

“I have no doubt.” He tells her, “But I’m not all that afraid of you.” 

A grin spreads molasses slow on Lydia’s face, sharp and almost feline, and she practically simpers, “Are you sure about that?” 

She drops into a crouch, a pose that should look far more at home on a cat but somehow it looks natural on her. This Lydia is like the one from his dream, from the night he had to keep her from killing three people. Sharp, predatory, and undeniably deadly.

Stiles doesn’t see her move but suddenly he’s in the air. He doesn’t feel the landing but when his eyes open again he’s staring up at her ceiling, nestled in the plush comforter on her bed, with her hair in a curtain around her staggeringly beautiful face, now back to normal. Lydia’s knees bracket his hips and one of her hands holds both of his above his head. The other one trails a fingernail down his cheek, raising goosebumps all down his right side. 

“You were saying?” She purrs and Stiles inhales sharply. 

“Wow.” He breathes. Lydia grins. “You are, in fact, a terrifying monster.” He manages.

She smirks, “Finally.” 

“And I’m so fucking in love with you.” Stiles whispers and her eyes look stricken for a moment. Her hand releases both of his, but he doesn’t move. He braces himself, feeling rejection coming on and he doesn’t actually know what that would do to him. For him to fall so hard for this girl and then all of a sudden have it ripped from him? He’s not sure how he’d survive it. 

“Stiles,” She whispers, “Stiles I…” She trails off, her breath coming in quick pants, “I love you.” She breathes. 

Stiles’ breath leaves him all in a rush, so quick he feels faint. “Awesome.” He murmurs and she giggles. She lays her head on his chest, resituating herself so she’s laying completely on top of him. He tries  _ desperately  _ to ignore his body’s reaction to this. 

Lydia hums, listening to his heart rabbit around in his chest and tracing patterns along the inside of his arm. 

They lay in silence for a while, just basking in being near each other. He manages to calm down enough to enjoy it, to simply  _ be  _ with her. By the time she says anything he’s almost falling asleep.

“Can I ask you a question?” Lydia finally asks. Stiles shakes himself out of his drowsiness. 

“Sure.” He mumbles.  

“Have you ever been in love?” She asks and he gnaws on his lip. 

“No, I haven’t.” He tells her, knowing that that doesn’t exactly add credence to his earlier declaration. But it doesn’t matter, he  _ knows  _ it’s true. 

“Me neither.” She whispers to his chest.

There’s a moment of silence, the two of them just breathing. 

“Then how do we know?” Lydia finally asks. Stiles takes a deep breath. 

“I don’t know.” He admits, “But I feel it. I know what this feeling is, I don’t have to know how I know.” 

Lydia’s quiet.

“I suppose.” She finally acquiesces. 

Stiles snorts. “That’s all I’m gonna get, isn’t it?” Lydia shrugs against his chest and he chuckles. “I’ll take it. I have time to prove it to you.” 

It’s a melancholy fact, the amount of time she has versus the amount of time he has. 

_ There’s a way,  _ his brain whispers to him but then he remembers the look on her face when Stiles had even glanced on the topic of him understanding the lust for life she’d described. She’d looked so uncomfortable, so nervous by the prospect. Things were different now, sure, but he thinks it’s probably unfair to expect she wants the same things as him. Even though the thought of her wanting something different physically aches. 

So, no, there isn’t a way. And he’s not going to ask that much of her, even just to ask about the mechanics. 

“Stiles,” She starts and he hums, “Why…why did you talk to me, when I did a terrible job of apologizing?”

“After the radio silence from the car accident?” He asks and she nods. “Because I liked you. And you seemed genuinely sorry, even if it was clear you weren’t sorry for trying to keep your distance. You were sorry for how you’d done it. That…made a difference for me.” Stiles struggles to explain, “If you’d just point blank apologised, if you hadn’t distinguished the difference, it would’ve felt like you were…appealing. Trying to make your case and get back on my good side.” 

“To be fair, I  _ was _ trying to get back on your good side.” She points out and Stiles huffs a laugh and kisses the top of her head. 

“Yes, but you didn’t lie to do it.” He explains. “That was the difference.” 

She hums but doesn’t say anything. 

“Lydia, do you sleep?” Stiles suddenly asks. Laying on her comfortable bed, with her in his arms, it’s made him want this--sleeping next to each other, waking up together. To each other. 

“In a way.” She says. He can’t think of a response to that and only manages to make a confused sound. She giggles. “Shortest answer, yes, I do. Longer answer, I don’t have to sleep as much as humans do, I probably don’t have to sleep at all. For the most part I do it out of habit. I don’t even dream. I just…like the comfort of it, the familiarity.” 

“Makes sense.” Stiles says. 

“I only sleep for two or three nights a week, maybe less, depending on the week. And never for longer than five hours.” She props her head up on his chest, her chin resting on her hand. Her eyes are soft, content; happy in a deep-seated way. It makes him smile down at her.

“Weird.” He says lightly. She giggles. 

“Well, in all fairness, I’m not human.” Lydia teases. Stiles smiles at her and she grins. 

“Do you like being a vampire?” 

Lydia hums, her lips pursing and pulling to the side in thought. The expression is so adorable he can’t help but lean in and kiss her. She kisses him back, scooting up to get a better angle. It’s slow, and leisurely, completely unhurried. It’s easy to sink into it, to let it linger between them even after they break apart to smile at each other. 

“Most often, yes, I do.” Lydia finally answers. He’d forgotten what he’d asked and has to spend a few second gathering his brain matter enough to think back. 

“When don’t you?” 

Lydia smiles sadly down at him. She trails a finger over the pulse point near his ear. “When I’m with you.” She admits, her voice soft, and so sad Stiles feels the need to wrap his arms around her and shelter her from the world even though she doesn’t need him to. He wraps his arms tighter around her anyways. 

“Why?” Stiles murmurs. She considers him for a moment, eyes searching his face for some sort of answer or absolution he doesn’t know how to give but desperately wishes he did. 

“I look at you and I see…life. A future, movement, motivation,  _ change.”  _ Lydia elaborates, “Things I have, but in the opposite ways. My future stretches endlessly where yours is limited by age. Your movement is propelled by that, your motivation. You have the concept of less time, of things being immediate and important. I don’t. And you’ll change. You’ll grow up and get older and learn. Your hair will keep growing, your face will sharpen. You’ll lose the evidence of childhood, of youth.” She sighs, smiles a wobbly smile down at him. 

“I won’t.” Lydia whispers. It feels like a punch, the truth of it, the force of her voice even though she’d barely spoken. It doesn’t matter. The weight is in the words themselves. 

Stiles looks down at her. He lifts a hand and lays it on her cheek, his thumb grazing her cheekbone. She leans into it, her eyes sliding shut, and she pulls her lip between her teeth.

“I…want what you have.” Lydia admits, “And I want it with you.” 

“Me too.” Stiles whispers. It’s true. And he doesn’t know if she wants to hear it, or even if it’s the right thing to say but it  _ is  _ the truth, and that means something. 

Lydia surges forward and kisses him. This one is urgent, heavy, and  _ insistent _ in a way he hasn’t experienced with her yet. Her lips are hard against his, hot and persistent but it’s not a good thing. 

It’s enjoyable, don’t get him wrong, his nerves are alight everywhere they touch, and he shudders with the fire that feels like it’s licking the inside of his veins. But it’s too much. It feels too much like she’s trying to do something, tell him something he’d rather hear than experience through a kiss that’s bruising and  _ amazing,  _ but wrong. 

He breaks apart and places his thumb on her bottom lip when she tries to lurch forward again. 

“Lydia, what’s wrong.” He doesn’t ask. It’s not a question; the answer isn’t optional. 

She shakes her head. She tries to roll off of him but he holds her fast. She could pull away easily, but she stays. 

“I want you to have that.” Lydia finally says, “And you can’t have it with me.” 

He shakes his head, panic starting to creep into his brain.  _ She’s trying to leave, leave, leave!  _

“That’s not true, and you know it.” Stiles insists, “Growing old together, kids, all of that is off the table for us but kids aren’t really on my radar anyways, I mean it’s entirely possible I never would have had them, I could’ve ended up with a guy.” He rambles, gaining speed, “And you can’t grow old with me, yeah, but you don’t  _ have to.  _ You can still be with me, if that’s what you want.” He falters for a second. “At least, it seems like you want that.” 

“Of  _ course _ I want that.” Lydia insists, pushing off his chest and leaning over him, obstructing his vision of everything but her, her hair falling over his shoulder like liquid fire, “I know it’s sudden and I know it’s a lot to suddenly place in your lap, but it’s true. I want you, as long as you’ll have me.” 

“Shit.” He breathes. It’s intense, to be the center of her attention, the focal point of her feelings. Lydia’s always been blunt, always told him exactly how she feels at any moment. But now, with her committing to forever with him after only truly being with him after not even five days…It’s a lot. 

He remembers his dad telling the story of how he’d met Claudia. Noah had always said that he’d known the moment they met that she was it for him. He’d managed to wait eight months to propose, but she had always said that she’d known too. That she’d wanted to walk down the aisle the moment they’d clicked. 

At the time, Stiles hadn’t believed it. Memories tend to be rose-coloured, tend to focus on the positives entirely, forgetting the time that passed. But now…now he gets it. 

He just knows.  

“That’s…that’s…” He struggles for something to say, something to convey how he feels. “You--I--” He huffs, “I want you.” He finally says. 

The grin that stretches across her face is  _ arresting,  _ dazzling and bright with love written all over it. It looks like her face might split in half with the force of it and Stiles can’t help but love her, can’t help but grin back in equal measure. 

“I love you.” She says, her grin staying firmly affixed despite the movement of her face. 

“I love you.”

Lydia leans down and  _ kisses him,  _ her lips crashing against his with intent, her tongue brushing against his bottom lip. He gasps and she takes advantage, her tongue joining the fray and making his toes  _ curl.  _ Shocks of pleasure run up his spine and his fingers tangle themselves in her hair. He manages not to curl them completely into her hair, manages not to pull, but it’s a near thing.

Lydia’s fingers find the hem of his shirt and duck under, sliding across his stomach, feeling the muscles tense beneath her almost scorching fingertips. His breathing speeds up, his heart fucking  _ racing  _ in his chest as she resettles herself over his legs, her knees on either side of his hips. She doesn’t move, doesn’t push down like he  _ desperately  _ wants her to but he knows she shouldn’t, not yet. 

Stiles groans and she smiles into the kiss, he can feel her lips pulling back. She breaks away to giggle and Stiles chases after her, bringing her lips back to his and biting her bottom lip. She makes a soft noise in the back of her throat that sounds so much like a moan a chill rips down Stiles’ spine, making his fingers curl into the fabric of her sweater. 

“Stiles.” Lydia murmurs against his lips, her voice breathless and high. He kisses her again, brings her back down to him and sliding his hand across her back. 

“Yeah?” He gasps against her lips when her hand skates up his torso.  _ Fuck she’s gonna kill us, we’re gonna die.  _ Yup, and he’s more than happy with that lot. 

She hums, kissing him sweetly, dragging her fingers through his hair. 

“We should stop.” Lydia mumbles against his lips. He groans, attempting to disengage but having to fight every instinct and practically uncurl the hand in her sweater finger by finger. 

“I don’t want to.” She assures, dropping her head down to his shoulder with his hand still in her hair. 

“I know.” Stiles says, trying to catch his breath, trying to ignore the heat at the base of his spine and the bruised quality of his lips as his tongue darts out, almost chasing her taste. And he does know. It would take an idiot not to see that she’s enjoying herself. 

But she’s not ready.  _ He’s  _ not ready, if he’s honest about it. It’s way too fast, not just for their relationship, but for him personally. He…wants it to be special. Not that it wouldn’t be special just by the merit of it being with Lydia, but he wants it to be planned. He wants to be prepared and able to show her how much he loves her. He’s a planner by heart, can he really be blamed?

“Do we need condoms?” He blurts out before he can stop himself. She laughs into his neck. 

“That’s one of the things I asked Victoria.” Lydia admits, her breath fanning across his skin “She wasn’t entirely sure, so, better to be safe than sorry.”

“Fair.” Stiles says. She pulls back and sits up on his lap. Her palm resting on his chest. She’s a vision like this, flushed and beaming down at him, her pupils huge and her lips kiss-swollen.  _ Fuck. _

“Fuck.” He gasps and Lydia grins. “You’re so beautiful.” 

“Thank you.” She inclines her head like a bow and leans forward to press a kiss to his forehead. “Come on, there’s more that I want to show you.” She’s a blur and in the space between blinks she’s standing in the middle of her room, with her closet door open, in front of a mirror hung on the other side. Lydia readjusts her sweater and her hair at a completely human pace, probably giving Stiles time to recover. 

He exhales and sits up. He runs a hand over his hair and can’t even tell if it’s more messed up now than it was before she’d attacked him. He watches her examine herself in the mirror, making a face before heading into her closet. She pulls her sweater over her head and Stiles squeaks. Lydia casts a look over her shoulder and smirks at him--she’s wearing a dark tank top under the sweater. She rifles through her clothes before settling on a deep green motorcycle jacket. She pulls it on and pulls her hair out from under the collar.  

He notices a scar on her neck. He thinks he might have noticed it before, might have registered the information before he’d known about what she is. But now, knowing what he does, he knows she shouldn’t have a scar. 

Stiles rolls from Lydia’s bed and reaches out to trail his fingertips over it. She shudders and looks up at him. 

“What’s that?” He asks. Lydia’s fingers come up to replace his. 

“It’s left over,” She starts, “From when Isaac…from when he saved me.” Stiles’ brows furrow. 

“Why did it scar?” 

“It’s a long story, and I’m not sure I’m the best one to tell it.” She hedges. 

“Does this have anything to do with what you wanted to show me?” 

Lydia tilts her hand back and forth. “Yes, but it’s only a small part of it. I want to introduce you to the Victoria that predates all of us.” She says. 

“You mean, I’ll get to hear the stories? How this all happened, how you all happened?” His voice gets more and more excited as he talks and he’s practically bouncing with the prospect by the end, bursting with the need to know, to  _ understand. _

“She seemed delighted by the prospect, truthfully.” Lydia says, smiling at him. 

Stiles bends to kiss her forehead. “Awesome.” 

She laces her fingers with his and leads him back down the hallway to Victoria and Chris’ office. The door is half cracked open, but Lydia knocks anyways. 

“Come in.” Victoria says from inside. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sooooo here's the thing i had to split up this chapter cuz it was getting so long so next time we'll have victoria's and a few others' stories, plus some explanations of the lore that i made up cuz vampires have so much potential and i feel the need to use them for all they're worth. (also we stan safe sex conversations with your immortal significant other, just by the way) 
> 
> (i'm so tired writing these notes i hope they're at least somewhat coherent)   
> (oh almost forgot, the painting i'm talking about in lydia's room is inspired by Clyfford Still's "1957-D-No. 1", lydia also has Roy Lichtenstein's "In the Car", and Magritte's "Blow to the heart" in case anyone was wondering. i have to flex my art history knowledge somewhere)


	14. Place Your Bets on Chance and Apathy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> imma be real with y'all, this chapter was so hard to write. but it's done!! i hope you guys continue to enjoy this, we're almost done. by my count, there's 19 chapters total of story, so 5 more chapters to go. thanks for sticking around for so long! i've had a really great time writing this.

Lydia pulls Stiles into the study and Victoria smiles at them. 

“What can I do for you?” She asks. Lydia sits in one of the chairs opposite Victoria’s and pulls Stiles with her. He sits in the other. 

“I wanted Stiles to hear your story, if you’re willing to tell it.” Lydia explains. Stiles thinks they’ve probably talked about this before, mostly because he doesn’t think Lydia would spring this on Victoria with no warning. 

“I’d be delighted.” Victoria says, looking like she actually might be. She turns to Stiles, “What would you like to know?” 

It’s a daunting question, to have the wealth of questions he’s accumulated answered and to learn more about the matriarch of this family.

“I’m not sure.” Stiles tells her honestly, “I guess, what should I know?” 

Victoria smiles. “Perhaps we should start at the beginning.” She puts down the fountain pen in her hand and leans back in her chair, her posture still unerringly perfect. Her eyes go distant as she laces her finger together. 

“I was born in what I believe to be 1599, in Scotland. Time wasn’t kept as well back then, neither were birth and death records for commoners. It’s simply my best guess. My life up to a certain point was quite ordinary, the monotonous day to day life of the time. Truthfully, I don’t remember much of it. Human memories tend to fade faster than the newer ones, at least from what I’ve observed.” She shakes her head, as though trying to redirect her thoughts to the story. 

“That all changed when a man called Gerard and his group of disciples moved through our village. He was noble, wealthy, and stunning in a way only our kind can be, despite his age. In him, it manifested as a warm presence, a comforting air. The closer one got, however, the more artificial it became. The people in my village tended to avoid him simply because of the instinctual aversion humans have towards us--traditionally.” She smiles conspiritorially at Stiles and he flushes. 

“I’ll spare you the horror flick, but suffice it to say that one night the plot of land that used to be my home became a mass grave. No one survived.” Her eyes take on a haunted quality, “Except, of course, for myself.” She’s quiet for a moment, seemingly trying to wrestle back her emotions.

“He’d turned me, let me experience every ounce of pain he could before he finally killed me. The worst part was that after all of it I woke up.” Victoria doesn’t look up, just keeps watching her laced fingers, her thumb nail methodically tracing the outline of her opposite pointer finger. 

“I stayed with him, out of necessity. He taught me the general mechanics of my nature, attempted to instill cruelty in me. But I wasn’t cruel in my first life and wasn’t about to be cruel in my next.” She smirks, but sobers quickly. “It was only after about three decades that I left him. Went on the run, evaded him and his followers at every turn. He wasn’t quite ready to give me up, it seemed. 

“I hated what I was.” She admits, finally looking up. Her eyes briefly lock with Stiles’ but they quickly dart away to survey her daughter, then back down to her desk. “Despised the way my nature actively harmed anyone near me. By the time I met Chris I was barely surviving, starving myself, stretching out the amount of time I went without hunting. In those days there was no way to get blood without killing, and I hated killing. I sought out criminals, attempted to limit the number of killers in the world since I was doomed to be one of them. 

“I was half-crazed with hunger when I found Chris in the woods.” Victoria’s lips turn up, and it’s like her whole demeanor changes. Her shoulders relax and the tension that had been laced through her whole body releases. “He was collecting firewood, something so innocuous and mundane I was halted. I’d spent so long interacting with only the most nefarious of people, those who were in the midst of their crimes when I found them. Seeing a man collecting firewood and looking so serene while doing it was so  _ different  _ from what I knew that all I could do was stop and stare. I didn’t plan on killing him, of course, he was innocent, as far as I could tell. He spotted me and the first thing he asked of me was ‘are you alright?’” She looks up at Stiles, her expression soft, “He meets a beautiful monster in the woods and he wonders after her well-being.” 

“Well, in my defense,” A voice says behind them, and Stiles turns to see Chris standing in the office doorway, “You looked quite horrendous underneath all of that supernatural beauty.” He darts to his wife’s side, a blur in Stiles’ periphery, and kisses her temple. 

“That is because I  _ felt  _ quite horrendous.” Victoria points out. She looks up at him and the look they share is so soft and loving Stiles feels like he’s intruding. It’s intriguing, to see a couple who’ve been together for more than three hundred years but are still quite happily enamored with each other. Stiles can’t help but look over at Lydia. 

She watches her parents with fondness written all over her face, a small smile pulling at her lips. 

“It was my saving grace.” Victoria says, still looking at her husband, “He helped me, even after learning what I really was.” 

“Then, of course, I was found guilty of witchcraft.” Chris interjects. 

“Wait,” Stiles can’t help but interrupt, “But the witch trials…?” 

“Normally targeted women, yes, but simply by my association with my mother--who was also found guilty--I was enough of a risk they decided to execute me as well.” Chris says all of this as though it hadn’t been more than an inconvenience  _ at best,  _ “It certainly didn’t help my case that I fought to save my mother’s life. That was a particularly dangerous choice.” 

“I turned him, before they could get the chance to kill him.” Victoria says, “Saved him like he saved me.” 

From looking at her, Stiles wouldn’t have assumed she was as much of a romantic as she seemingly is. But it’s more than that. The words themselves are romantic, but her delivery is so matter of fact, so pragmatic, that Stiles can’t really see them as romantic. The only thing he can call them is ‘factual’. Victoria knows for a fact that what she says is true, and she doesn’t have to dress it up with flowery language. 

“It was just the two of us for a little over a century.” Victoria continues, “And somewhere in there I learned of Gerard’s death. We didn’t have to run as far, could settle more often than not. And I was able to educate myself, became acquainted with medicine, found a passion in it.” 

“To call what they did back then ‘medicine’ is a touch generous.” Chris says and Stiles laughs. 

Victoria rolls her eyes, “Yes, well, what  _ I  _ practiced was medicine, at least as much as I could. I still can’t believe it took them so long to realise cleanliness was the easiest way to avoid infection. Thank God for Ignaz.” 

Stiles feels like he should know who that is, truly, but can’t put his finger on it. 

“Who?” He asks. 

“Ignaz Semmelewis,” Lydia says, “The first doctor to wash his hand pre- and post-delivering babies. Both mothers and children were saved from infections.” She explains, “And he’d been laughed out of scientific communities because of it.” A crease forms between her brows and Stiles bites back the smile. 

“A lovely man as well, very intelligent.” Victoria says. Stiles jaw drops open. 

“You  _ knew  _ him?” He asks, disbelief lacing his tone. 

Victoria chuckles, “Yes, I knew him. I’ve known many people over the course of history. I was one of the nurses in the Crimean war with Florence.” 

“That is a lot of information to gain very suddenly.” Stiles says and Victoria laughs. Until now, Victoria’s life had felt so abstract, tied only to her and her story. But now that he has connectors to other people and places he knows from history it’s all the more real. 

“Medicine was a difficult field to get into as a woman, Florence was one of the only ways to do it. She was a truly amazing woman, methodical and precise, and so caring. It was a tragedy when she died.” Victoria looks incredibly sad, staring off into the distance. 

Stiles can see it now, the age in her eyes. This woman is over four hundred years old and she’s met and lived and worked with so many people during her life. And every time she’d had to leave them behind, or had had to watch them die. There were so many people that she’d had to watch grow old while she’d stayed unchanging. 

Stiles can’t even imagine. 

“We had Allison by then. She took an interest in nursing from Florence, admired her enormously. Florence herself saw so much potential in Allison, would’ve recruited her to her school had we still been in the country at the time.” Victoria says. 

“Allison?” Stiles inquires, “When did she join up?” 

Victoria chuckles at his phrasing, “1836.” 

“Woah.” Stiles can’t help but say. It’s wild, the girl he’d met downstairs who’d been the first handshake and commented on the temperature of his skin is nearly two  _ hundred  _ years old. 

“She was the first, after Chris.” Victoria says, “It was at that point that we realised we could have a family, that the opportunity wasn’t lost on us.” She smiles up at her husband, who trails the backs of his fingers over her cheek. 

Stiles looks over at Lydia, feeling again like he’s intruding. She smiles at him. 

“They’re always like this.” She tells him. Victoria makes a playful face at her daughter. 

“After Allison we moved to the States, the New World. At the time, the country was right on the brink of civil war and Allison and I volunteered our nursing services.” 

“Wait, hang on,” Stiles interrupts, “How does that work? Doesn’t the blood…bother you?” It occurs to him after the words are already out of his mouth that that may be an incredibly offensive question to ask.

But Victoria’s lips twitch and she answers, “It’s easier to resist in a situation where there are distractions, much to do, when one has something to focus on. And, beyond that, the situations of the day, the state of the wounded--there wasn’t much to be desired.” 

Stiles briefly thinks of all the things he’d heard or read about the Civil War and could imagine that there’d be nothing appetizing about the whole situation. He wrinkles his nose. 

“Yes, precisely.” Victoria chuckles, “With the improvement of medicine it became more difficult, the sterilization making it so that there was more exposure and less distraction. It took quite a while to get back to the status of surgeon, for me.” 

“What about Allison? Does she still do nursing?” Stiles asks.

“Sometimes.” Chris says, “Every once in a while she goes to school for it. She finds it harder to actually do it as a profession, now, but she does love learning more about the field.” 

Stiles can imagine, with all of time at your disposal, how easy and amazing it would be to see how the world developed, how people changed and learned and grew. How the world got better or worse, how everything came to be. All of the events leading up to something would become cohesive, not just dates in a textbook that have to be related to others to get any sort of relevance.  

“Isaac was one of the soldiers Allison helped during the war.” Victoria continues, as though Stiles had never asked his--frankly insensitive--question. “And after him came Lydia.” Victoria smiles at her, “And finally Jackson in ‘62.” 

“Damn.” Stiles says, not necessarily meaning to say it. It’s a lot of information to process all at once, to suddenly know so much about these people but know so little at the same time. He doesn’t know their stories, not really. He doesn’t know the reasons they had for becoming what they are, whether or not they chose it. He wants to find out.

“Now, I believe you have other questions regarding our existence that Lydia couldn’t answer for you.” Victoria says and Stiles sits straight up.  _ Finally.  _ Not that he hadn’t wanted to hear Victoria’s story, he actually wishes she could’ve told him  _ more,  _ but he was still so anxious to learn anything he could about a whole new  _ state of being.  _

“So many.” Stiles admits. 

Victoria gestures with her hand to urge Stiles on. 

“Okay, well,” He pauses, parsing through his thoughts and trying to find what he wants to ask. “I can’t think of a single question.” 

Lydia giggles, “Previously, he’s asked about our diet.” 

Stiles snaps his fingers, “Yes, that, why blood? Why can’t anything else keep you alive? What’s special about blood?” 

Victoria leans forward, “Short answer: I don’t know. Longer and slightly more involved answer: drinking blood keeps our hearts beating. From what I can tell--without copious research and testing as I don’t have access to willing volunteers as of this moment--” She smirks at him, “We no longer produce our own blood and require supplemental material. Blood is the most efficient system by which the brain receives oxygen, which I believe our brains still need. We  _ can _ hold our breath for far longer than any human ever could and we can go longer between heart beats--hence why we don’t immediately drop dead without blood--but we still need some sort of driving force, some sort of energy that powers the whole system. 

“As far as I can tell, our metabolisms are fixed, they don’t work to pull nutrients from food like they used to, so that isn’t where we get our energy. We get the energy from--and this is where it becomes mysticism and deviates from science--” Victoria looks to Stiles and smiles ruefully, “The life force. I’ve researched this concept heavily, as has Lydia, and the main theme of many cultures is that blood holds some sort of power. In Christianity, the blood of Christ is sacred, something to be shared in great reverence; in Aztec cultures, blood was the only way to pacify the Gods and continue to live on Earth as it was; Judaism attributes life to blood and prohibits the consumption of it. It’s seen through different cultures, religions, and legends, so the conclusion I have drawn is that blood has always been significant within the concept of livelihood, and not just because humans need it as that avenue for oxygen transport. It is the driving force for our existence  _ because  _ it’s that life force. Does that make sense?” And Victoria seems almost shy, like Stiles might reject her theories. 

“If blood is the meaning of life, like blood is  _ why  _ there is life at all, that has so many implications.” Stiles says, his head spinning with all of it. 

Victoria chuckles, “Yes, it does.” 

“I can see why it’s difficult to reconcile science with all of that.” Stiles says, “No wonder you had trouble explaining all of that.” He says to Lydia. 

“Yes, it’s quite a lot to homogenize.” Lydia smiles. 

“Okay, so, I guess I’m also wondering how being a vampire affects your brain.” Stiles says, “Like, does it make it harder or easier to process information? Can you still learn and develop in the same way humans can? Do your brains maintain elasticity or do they eventually stagnate?” Stiles asks, his brows furrowing. 

“They process things faster than human brains.” Victoria says, “We learn things quicker, categorize information more efficiently and in less time.” 

“I see why you picked medicine.” Stiles says. Victoria laughs.

“Yes, a field with copious and equally important information and constantly changing parameters certainly assists.” 

“God, high school must be  _ hell.”  _ Stiles looks over at Lydia, who throws back her head and laughs, surrounding him in the melody that belongs solely to her. He grins at the sound.

“Well, I’ve experienced worse, but I will admit I’m rather tired of analyzing Shakespeare and hearing the same edited version of history time and time again.” Lydia shrugs elegantly. 

“I literally can’t even imagine.” Stiles says. Endless days in high school, going through the same information told in slightly different ways over and over again. He shakes his head in disbelief. 

“We try to travel around the world for variety.” Chris intones and Stiles snorts. 

“Seems reasonable.” Stiles thinks of something else, “Wait, so why do some of you have special abilities but not others?” 

Victoria grins. “I have a working theory on that.” She stands and circles her desk to lean on it positioned in front of Lydia, “Would you mind being a guinea pig for a moment?” She asks her daughter and Lydia rolls her eyes but offers her agreement. 

“Lydia, what was the last thought you remember having before dying?” Victoria asks bluntly. Admittedly, Stiles had been wondering something similar in a more existential way, like what was the most important thing to her when she’d died, what had she wanted in the end--or what she had thought the end was. 

“Isaac was leaning over me,” Lydia starts, “The most beautiful man I’d ever seen and he was in a damp ravine with me, trying to speak to me. I couldn’t say anything back, couldn’t get my body to function normally. I could see his lips moving but couldn’t hear a word he said. I was fading, I knew I was dying, this was it.” Her eyes stare straight ahead, distant, “And I wanted to know what he was saying. I wanted to  _ understand,  _ to know what he wanted with me, why he was here, what he was thinking.” She looked up at Victoria, “The last thought I’d had before I died was wanting to understand Isaac, to know what he was thinking.” 

“And now you read minds.” Stiles says, “Holy shit--sorry.” He apologizes to Lydia’s parents but they simply smile, “So that’s it? The last thought you have before you die is what determines your gift?” 

“Yes and no,” Victoria clarifies, “It has to be a strong desire, something you want with everything that you are the  _ second _ you die.” 

“So, what about Isaac?” Stiles asks, “What was he thinking about?” 

“My beautiful wife.” Isaac’s voice says behind him. Stiles spins around. “Truly. I wanted to introduce myself to this beautiful woman leaning over me, to court her, maybe even marry her someday. I wanted a  _ future,”  _ Isaac says, stressing the word, compelling Stiles to understand, “Now I have all the future I could want.” He winks and Stiles grins. 

“And I’d wanted Victoria’s safety, her continued happiness and well-being,” Chris adds, “Now I have ‘the gift of calming presence’, or so my children call it.” 

Stiles laughs at the obvious quotations around the phrase. 

“Does anyone else have a gift?” 

“Jackson does,” Lydia says, “Though that’s his story to tell.” Stiles nods. It makes sense to him, and besides that, he doesn’t want to give Jackson any more reasons to dislike him. 

“Anyways,” Isaac says and Victoria chuckles, “I just wanted to let you know that we’re good to play tonight, thunder is imminent.” He says, and though the statement should sound ominous, Isaac’s smile is too mischievous for it to be taken at all seriously. Stiles turns to Lydia, whose eyes are glinting in a way that has him flushing, reminding him of the day before, in the meadow when she’d shown him everything she could do. Up to and including climbing into his lap and kissing him within an inch of his life.  

_ Was it really only yesterday? _

“What are you playing?” Stiles asks. Isaac grins. 

“Little game we made up to prove to each other who’s truly superior.” He lifts his chin haughtily. Lydia scoffs. 

“Like you could  _ ever  _ best Allison.” She says and Stiles turns to catch her roll her eyes. 

“Maybe not with the archery  _ itself,” _ Isaac allows, “But no one has me beat on receiving.” 

Chris chuckles, “Well, we shall see about that, won’t we?” Stiles’ head whips back and forth between speakers, getting more and more confused at time goes on. 

“No, like, actually, what are you playing?” Stiles insists. 

Lydia laughs but takes pity on him,  “It’s like archery. There are targets at one end of the range and archers at the other. But, in order to make the game more interesting, the goal is to fire the arrow fast enough and well enough that the players on the other side of the field can’t catch them.” 

“ _ Catch  _ them?” Stiles almost squeaks. 

Isaac’s grin turns feral. “And I’m the best at it.” He says and Stiles doesn’t doubt it for a second. 

“So, I’m meant to go with you and do…what?” He asks, feeling his humanity acutely. 

“Nothing.” Lydia says, “You’re going to watch, and let me show off.” She smirks at him and he tries,  _ desperately,  _ to get his heart to chill the fuck out. It doesn’t work, but it seems like the vampires in the room are willing to let it go. 

“Okay.” Stiles says, not knowing what else  _ to  _ say, and still  _ quite _ willing to indulge his girlfriend, who apparently loves to show off. Hell, he’ll let her show off every day of his life from here forward if it would make her beam at him like she’s doing now. 

“Allow us to gather our things and we should be ready to leave in ten minutes or so.” Victoria interjects and Stiles flushes, realising he’d been so caught up in Lydia he’d pretty much forgotten anyone else was there.

“Sounds lovely.” Lydia says, standing. Stiles follows her but stops in the doorway. 

“Thank you,” He directs at Victoria, “For telling me your story. And answering some of my questions.” Victoria looks somewhat startled by Stiles’ genuine gratitude, but composes herself and inclines her head. 

“Of course, Stiles. ‘New knowledge is the most valuable commodity on earth. The more truth we have to work with, the richer we become.’” She says, and it sounds like a quote, or a saying of some kind, but he doesn’t recognize it. 

Stiles nods, taps the door frame twice, and follows Lydia. 

She heads to her bedroom and shuts the door behind them. She spins around and leans up to kiss him. He dips to oblige her and sinks into it until she breaks apart. 

“I’m going to change.” She says, “Behave.” She teases him and he raises his hands up in surrender. 

Lydia smirks before disappearing into her closet. 

Stiles surveys the art on her walls again, pacing through the room to follow the movement of the arrangement. 

He recognizes one of the pieces, Roy Lichtenstein’s  _ In the Car,  _ and for some reason, it makes complete sense that she would have it. There’s art in all different styles on her walls, but most of them are abstract, splotches of colour on canvas that each give him a distinct impression, a distinct feeling. 

He doesn’t know anything about art, not really, but he can tell that she prefers the expressive pieces, the ones that don’t tell you what the want you to know, but  _ show you.  _ And, from what she told him, that makes perfect sense. 

She emerges, dressed in tight athletic pants, a black tank top, and a tight sweatshirt zipped up halfway seemingly just to taunt him. Lydia’s tied her hair up in a ponytail and her curls sway as she walks back to him. He can’t stop his eyes from raking over every inch of her, every curve of her accentuated by her clothes. 

“Are you trying to kill me?”Stiles asks her and she laughs, throwing her head back. He wants to lean forward and kiss the smooth expanse of skin, but neck kisses are still off limits,  _ tragically.  _

“Perhaps, just a little.” Lydia admits, grinning. Stiles scoffs. 

“Now that’s just rude.” 

She giggles. 

“I never claimed to be polite.” She states, her chin tipped up haughtily. Stiles reels her in by her waist and kisses her. 

He’s never gonna get tired of this, never gonna stop relishing in the feeling of her lips, the way her body moulds effortlessly to his. He’s never gonna get over the way that she curls her fingers in his hair, the way she lifts herself onto her toes to gain leverage, the way she hooks her arm over his shoulder. 

He breathes her in, bemoaning the presence of the pony tail and the fact that it’s kept his fingers out of her hair. He compensates by placing one hand on her hip and pulling her closer. She gasps and he goes when she starts pushing him back. His back lands on the wall and she leans against him, her fingers tugging at his hair. 

“Shouldn’t we…?” Stiles trails off, too caught up in her to properly finish his thought. 

Lydia hums in response but spins them so that she’s the one against the wall. He takes the cue and pushes her against it, but brings her hips forward against his. Lydia gives another almost-moan and he can’t help but groan back as she pulls him ever closer by his flannel. 

“Probably.” She answers and Stiles has to think back to what he’d said. 

“So…” He trails off again when one of her hands dips under his shirt again and moves up his back. It raises chills despite its warmth and he shudders. 

She breaks away, panting lightly. Her eyes are still closed when he opens his and her lips are red and slightly swollen. 

“Jesus.” He whispers, leaning his forehead against hers. 

“Yeah.” She breathes. “I don’t know how I’m going to stop.” 

Stiles leans away, but can’t bring himself to let go of her completely. 

“Me neither.” He tells her. She giggles breathlessly and opens her eyes. 

“We should go.” Lydia says and he attempts to disentangle  himself. The hand on his back trails down his skin, sending shocks across his spine and his hands curl into fists where they’re still resting on her hips. 

“Jesus  _ christ,  _ you’re gonna kill me.” Stiles breathes. 

“Completely unintentionally.” She says, her voice an octave or two higher than normal. 

“I know.” He says.

“And I sincerely hope I don’t. You’re far more interesting alive.” She teases and he grins down at her. 

“Why, thank you, miss.” He says. 

“Oh, you are most welcome, sir.” Lydia simpers, adopting a flawless southern accent. Stiles laughs. 

“I forgot you lived in Georgia.” He admits. 

“Born and raised a Georgia Peach.” She says, the twang evident in almost every vowel. He laughs again, but he kinda likes it too. 

“You certainly look like a peach.” He says, stroking a thumb across her flushed cheek. She rolls her eyes at his crappy joke and sticks her tongue out at him. 

“We should go.” She sighs, placing her hands gently on his shoulders and pushing him lightly away. His hands fall to his sides and he darts in to kiss her forehead before it’s too late. She glares at him without heat. 

“I’m done, I promise.” Stiles tells her and Lydia mock-scowls at him. 

She slips between him and the wall and leads him back out of her room. He wishes he could say he isn’t watching the sway of her hips, but he is. 

They join her family in the garage where they’re each a blur, packing up a few cars that  _ tower  _ over the ground, held up by huge tires. He assumes they’re meant for off-roading, and he’s momentarily surprised before realising that if they need  _ thunder  _ to play this game, they definitely need to play somewhere they can only get to by off-roading. 

Stiles feels awkward, wanting to help out of politeness but also not knowing where anything is or how he can possibly help. Lydia must notice this because she grins and leads him to one of the cars--if it can even be  _ called  _ that, which he doubts. It towers over him despite the fact that he’s not a short guy at six feet. 

“You want me to get into this without making a fool of myself?” Stiles asks her. She giggles. 

“Well you don’t have to do it  _ flawlessly,”  _ She insists, opening the door to the backseat, “But I promise to reward you for your efforts.” She says, innocently blinking up at him. 

Then Lydia darts past him, performing an acrobatic maneuver at a completely human speed, probably just so he can watch her twirl up into the car and sit primly in the seat further away from the door, her ponytail still swinging from her movement. 

Stiles scowls at her and grabs hold of either side of the door to hoist himself into the car. He actually manages to climb into the car with minimal damage and once he’s properly situated--with the harness buckled over him, because off-roading, apparently--he turns to see Lydia just inches from his face. He startles and she laughs quietly, her breath ghosting across his face. 

“That was perfect.” Lydia almost  _ purrs  _ and one of his hands curls into a fist to keep from doing something stupid like try to make out with her while her family is  _ right there.  _

“Thanks.” He breathes and she grins. 

She leans forward and drags her lips across the underside of his jaw, rendering him completely useless and inarticulate. She places a soft kiss against the skin beneath his ear and he inhales sharply. 

“Oh, gross.” Jackson says as he climbs effortlessly into the driver’s seat. Stiles flushes from head to toe and averts his gaze as Lydia pulls back. Lydia growls--actually  _ growls-- _ at her brother and withdraws from Stiles while Allison swings up into the seat next to Jackson. 

“Be nice.” Allison chastises him and Jackson scoffs. He turns the car on and it roars to life, even louder than Stiles’ jeep usually is. He manages not to startle at the sound and feels disproportionately triumphant about it. 

Stiles doesn’t know why he gives a shit what Jackson thinks of him, everyone else in Lydia’s family likes him--he thinks--why does Jackson matter? 

The small and spiteful part of him insists that it’s jealousy, that Jackson threatens what he has with Lydia, but that’s  _ ridiculous,  _ considering the fact that he himself even referred to Jackson as Lydia’s brother and it’s stupid of Stiles to think about Jackson like he’s not. 

And, if it isn’t all of that, it’s probably because Jackson’s an asshole. And maybe that’s all there is to it. 

Allison turns in her seat to regard Stiles and Lydia. 

“Isaac knows where we’re headed, so he’s driving mom and dad and we’ll follow them.” She informs them and winks at Stiles before righting herself. 

Jackson follows Isaac out of the garage and out onto the street. 

The ride to wherever they’re going is long and boring, even at the speed Jackson’s going. Allison tires her level best to include Stiles in conversation and Lydia hardly speaks to Jackson at all, which confuses Stiles until he remembers that she can read minds--which is a weird thing to forget, but she doesn’t read his, so why would he be constantly aware of it?--and probably heard Jackson think something particularly uncharitable. And, of course, Lydia ignoring Jackson makes him surly. 

All in all, Stiles kinda wishes he was in the other car and he can’t help but be relieved when they finally reach a point in their journey where the car is bouncing over logs and rocks too much for conversation to be reasonable. 

The car bounces beneath him and he understands the harness-like seat belt now, feeling distinctly like if it weren’t there he would have gone  _ through  _ the roof of the car by now. His teeth chatter and his fingertips buzz with sensation from the movement, and his brain feels like it’s becoming far too acquainted with his skull. 

When they finally,  _ finally,  _ roll to a stop, Stiles’ ears are ringing and like his bones haven’t  _ quite  _ finished vibrating. He shakes his head to try and right himself, which doesn’t actually help. Lydia giggles at him and he tries to scowl at her though he’s pretty sure it doesn’t translate. He unbuckles himself and stumbles out of the car, managing to catch himself on the door before he face plants in the dirt.

Lydia leans casually against his side of the car, examining her fingernails. 

“Did you enjoy the ride?” She asks him innocently. 

“There’s a dirty joke in there, I’m just not cognizant enough to tell it.” He tells her and she laughs. 

“Come on, I’ll take you to the field.” Lydia spins and motions for him to climb onto her back. He’s going to accept this, mostly because he has no choice, but also because her family has seemingly already left and gone to the field they’re playing in and he won’t have to look like a large ape circling around her comparatively tiny body in front of them. 

It’s no less exhilarating this time, flying through the trees at inhuman speeds while she glides over rough terrain as though it hadn’t even been there in the first place. Stiles can’t even feel the movement of her legs or the uneven ground, all he can feel is the wind whipping across his face and through his hair and the pure  _ elation _ travelling like this brings. 

Lydia slows to a stop just within the barrier of trees so he can climb down and regain feeling in his legs without her family staring at him. 

Looking out onto the field he can see the targets being set up what has to be half a mile away from where the other Argents are standing, which seems like a fucking  _ ridiculous  _ distance, but he supposes that he can’t exactly hold them to human standards, so this may be a completely logical distance for them. 

Isaac is suddenly in front of him and Stiles startles enough that Isaac reaches out to steady him. Stiles glares, but it does nothing. 

“Ready?” Isaac asks, the excitement bleeding off of him in waves. 

“Guess so.” Stiles says. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i made up a new game cuz i can't really see the argents playing baseball, idk why. 
> 
> up next: vampires are show offs and stiles wishes he wasn't impressed


	15. Glaciers Melting in the Dead of Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: the document for this on my computer was created on march 4th, marking today as the 6 month anniversary of its birth

Isaac leads him to a huge overturned tree where Chris is already sitting. Stiles joins him and Isaac shoots off a sloppy salute before flashing across the field and standing directly in front of Allison, too close to be anything other than flirting. Well, whatever flirting means when one’s already been married for at least a hundred years, anyways. 

“Do you not wanna play?” Stiles asks Chris. Chris chuckles. 

“No, I don’t play. I, unlike my children, don’t feel the need to posture.” He grins and Stiles laughs. 

“So vampires are just show-offs, it’s not just a personal trait?” 

Chris shrugs, “It seems I am, in fact, the outlier.” 

Stiles likes Chris, and part of it is the calming air about him, the way Stiles feels naturally at ease around him, but he also just personally likes him. He’s subtly funny and incredibly caring and steady in a way that makes Stiles think of his dad. It’s nice. 

“And they need someone to keep them honest.” Chris says and Stiles laughs. 

“How do you cheat at this? It seems pretty straight forward.”

Chris smirks at him, “Just wait. Isaac and my wife are particularly guilty.” 

Victoria is suddenly next to her husband, resting a hand on his shoulder, but his shoulder dips slightly, so Stiles assumes she must be pressing ridiculously hard. 

“Now, dear, you know I’m trying to make a good impression.” She says, her voice sickly sweet. Chris looks up at her. 

“Then perhaps you should play honestly, and then see where you are then.” 

Stiles laughs as Victoria purses her lips at her husband. 

“Fine, I see where your loyalties lie.” She flashes back across the field and outfits her arm with the wrist guard. 

“Wait, why does she need the guard, there’s no way the bow can hurt her?” Stiles asks.

“Well, no, but the unyielding quality of our skin damages the bowstrings. It’s simply easier to wear them. Similar to the finger guards, they’re not necessary to us, but it keeps the bows strong for longer.” Chris explains, then shoots Stiles a wry grin, “Which isn’t to say we don’t go through bows incredibly quickly, but we try not to. The ones we have to buy are quite expensive.” 

“Because they have to be long range?” Stiles guesses. Chris glances over, smiling. 

“Yes, and we often have to modify them to ensure they remain intact for more than one game.” 

“Wild.” Stiles says and Chris chuckles. 

“Indeed.” 

Stiles looks out onto the field and sees Lydia positioned next to the targets, looking bored from what he can see, which isn’t much at that distance. He and Chris are positioned roughly in the middle of the two ends, and while Chris can see each side perfectly, Stiles only has vague impressions of everything. 

“Are we ready?” Chris asks at a normal volume, and at first, Stiles thinks he’s talking to him and he turns to answer before Chris nods. Stiles looks out onto the field and sees the archers lining up: Allison, Victoria, and Jackson. They notch their arrows but don’t draw. 

“Aim.” Chris says, again at a perfectly reasonable volume and the archers raise their arrows. 

Chris waits a few beats, building up suspense if Stiles had to guess, and then suddenly a violent crack of lightning sounds followed by booming thunder so loud Stiles startles. 

Chris grins sideways at him and says, “Fire.” Impassively, like he’s exchanging pleasantries.  

They let their arrows fly and the moment they do, Lydia and Isaac on the other side of the field run across the targets, directly in harm’s way, and emerge on opposite sides. Stiles understands the need for thunder when one of the arrows pierces through a target with a crack so loud Stiles  _ feels _ it. 

Lydia is triumphantly holding an arrow up and twirling it like a baton, and Isaac is empty handed with his hands on his hips. Stiles thinks he can see Allison flipping her hair over her shoulder. 

“Woah.” Is all Stiles can think to say following that display. 

“Indeed.” Chris replies and Stiles sees Lydia double over before darting across the field to him, a black-and-red blur across the green landscape before stopping in front of him to drop a kiss on his cheek. 

“Would it be overconfident of me to say ‘you haven’t seen anything yet’?” She asks and Stiles laughs. 

“Well, you said it wrong.” Stiles points out. She shrugs. 

“To be perfectly frank, I can’t stand the word ‘ain’t’.” Lydia tells him and he laughs again. 

“Maybe.” He says, answering her question, “But I’d forgive you for it.” She grins, slow like molasses, and runs back to the field, taking a bow from Jackson and notching an arrow. 

Victoria and Jackson take the positions at the end of the field with the targets, leaving Lydia, Allison, and Isaac with bows. 

Stiles is starting to notice the differences between them, now that he’s at least somewhat used to their displays of impossible feats. Victoria runs with calculated grace, and he remembers his first impression of her at the hospital; offhandedly murderous, like a queen who--by the wave of a hand--determines the fate of her people. She glides across the ground, her legs long and her back straight. It’s an intimidating display, to say the least, as if the woman needed more to grant her intimidation. 

Jackson runs low to the ground, athleticism evident in every step. He slides into position, not because he has to--because Stiles very much doubts that he does--but probably because he likes the way that it looks. Which Stiles feels is probably very in character for him. 

Isaac bounds, long legs seeming to leap from one step to the other, kind of like a deer--if a deer could be a predator. Because there’s no denying to strength behind the motion, the lethal grace he exudes. It’s entirely too hard to describe. 

He hasn’t seen Allison do much running yet, but if he had to guess, he’d say she moves like a gymnast, controlled and precise, stopping abruptly rather than slowing to a stop like Stiles has seen Lydia do. 

And then there’s Lydia. Lydia, who’s so indescribable Stiles is winded from watching her. She moves freely, completely unencumbered, like the weight of her body is of no consequence to her. She lacks the athleticism Jackson has, but she practically  _ radiates _ elegance. Stiles remembers seeing a ballet once when he was younger, and watching one of the ballerinas spin, her arms moving in and out and up with precision and grace, fluid and controlled down to the fingertips. Lydia moves like that, calculated, flowing, lithe; completely in control and aware of her body. 

Another group of arrows fly and none of them hit the targets, Victoria holding two in her hands and Jackson holding one. If Stiles had to guess--which he does, because he’s roughly a quarter of a mile away--Jackson is glowering at Victoria. Stiles even doubts it’s good natured, seeing as how Jackson doesn’t seem to have anything good natured about him. 

The rounds continue that way, vampires impossibly catching arrows in midair and then even more impossibly getting arrows  _ past  _ those who are catching. Allison tends to fire the arrows more than catch them, and Isaac tends to catch more than fire, but for the most part, they switch out. 

Lydia--predictably--seems to be equally great at both. 

Victoria, surprisingly, gets reprimanded by Chris more than once, mostly for firing milliseconds too soon. She objects every time, even tries to win her husband over by sweet talking but Chris seems completely immune. Stiles snickers to himself and Chris cuts him a sly smile. 

Suddenly and seemingly without any warning or reason at all, Isaac stops. 

He stands, having halted in his movement to switch out with one of the other Argents, in the middle of the field, completely still. 

Chris stands as Lydia runs immediately over to Stiles.

“Come on.” She says, her voice low and dangerous. 

“What?” Stiles asks as she grabs onto his arm and starts handily moving him from the clearing. 

Isaac darts over to her, stopping in their path. “No, it won’t matter, they already know he’s here, they’ll have smelled him. They’ll follow you.” 

A shiver rips up Stiles spine, leaving him tense and looking frantically between the two Argents. 

“What’s going on?” Stiles asks. 

“There’s others.” Isaac says, “Other vampires, they must have heard us playing. They’re heading this way, less than five minutes at best, not enough time to get you out.” Stiles’ heart launches into his throat. Isaac spares Stiles a glance and he looks so sorry, so guilty, that Stiles wants to reassure him, tell him everything’s gonna be fine. 

But, obviously, he doesn’t know that it will. 

God, he really hopes it will. 

“Isaac, he can’t stay here.” Lydia says, speaking fast and holding onto Stiles arm tight enough to be painful.

Isaac turns his gaze back to her, his eyes pleading, “Do not leave with him, Lydia.” He shuts his eyes for a moment, “You know what will happen if you do.” 

Lydia winces and gasps, seemingly uncontrollably, probably in response to whatever she’s seeing in Isaac’s head. Her eyes are wide and terrified as she turns them on Stiles. 

“Lydia, what--” He starts but she interrupts him, cutting him off by slanting her lips over his so hard he stumbles. He thinks Isaac’s hand might’ve come up to steady them but he isn’t sure because the second her lips come down on his he’s gone, sliding into the kiss with ease and placing his hand on either side of her face. 

She breaks off and leans her forehead against his. “We’re going to get you out of this.” She promises.  _ “I  _ will get you out of this” 

Lydia looks up into his eyes, begging him to understand.  “I promise.” She whispers and Stiles can’t do anything but nod, his throat steadily closing up. 

Because it sounds too much like a goodbye, or a closing speech, or the speech given at the end of a movie right before the final battle. 

It feels too hopeless for him to be at all comforted by it. 

“How many?” Chris asks, coming up close to Isaac and placing a hand on his shoulder with Victoria on Chris’ other side

“Three, heading this way, running. Five minutes, tops.” Isaac repeats and all the air in Stiles’ lungs abruptly vacates. 

“What do they want?” Allison asks from Isaac’s other side. 

“They’re curious.” Is all he says and everyone seems to take this at face value. 

“Only three?” Jackson asks, closing their circle-of-sorts. He scoffs, “We can take three.” 

“Yes,” Victoria agrees, “We could. But let’s not try.” Jackson rolls his eyes but subsides enough to hear what Victoria’s plan is. 

She deliberates for a few seconds, each of them feeling longer than the least, making Stiles practically crazy. 

“We stay, keep calm, look as though we heard them coming and stopped playing to greet them.” Victoria says and Allison runs back out to the field and gathers their things. 

“Then let’s go.” Chris says and the Argents head to the middle of the field. 

“Lydia, what’s happening?” Stiles asks, turning to her--not because he doesn’t know, necessarily, but because he needs  _ more;  _ more information, a plan, more time,  _ something.  _

“There are other vampires, they’re heading this way, they probably want to see what we’re doing, what’s making so much noise,” She explains breathlessly, reiterating what Isaac already said, “They’ll probably want to play a few rounds with us and then they’ll leave. Other vampires don’t tend to like us very much; we unnerve them. 

“But you and I will be leaving the moment it’s safe. We can’t leave now, if we do, they’ll follow us instead of staying here in the field while I get you home.” She shuts her eyes, seeming to wrestle with something. Her eyes turn back up to his, wide and green and full of fear. “I’m so sorry, Stiles.” 

And that--that sentiment and those words coming from her when she looks so scared--sends him straight into a panic. 

Intellectually, he understands that he needs to get a handle on that shit before it becomes an actual problem, so he resorts to math problems.

Lydia pulls him into the middle of the field by his hand, lacing her fingers with his and periodically looking over her shoulder at him, no doubt feeling his hand shaking in hers. 

_ Six times six? Thirty-six. Twelve times eleven? One-twenty-three.  _

They reach her family and they immediately form a protective circle around Stiles, Victoria and Chris in the front as the leaders, and Lydia next to him, clutching his hand and wrapping her other hand around his bicep. Jackson is on his other side, offering Stiles nothing more than a glance and an impassive nod. For whatever reason, it makes Stiles feel better. Isaac and Allison are flanking Chris and Victoria. They’re each holding a bow casually, as though they’d been interrupted mid game. Isaac is even holding onto an arrow, resting it casually against his shoulder.

Allison turns and offers Stiles a hard look of determination and a nod, and he knows what she’s trying to say even though she’s said nothing.  _ You’re getting out of this.  _

_ Five times--no fives are easy, shit, what else? Eight times fourteen? Eight times ten, eighty; eight times four, thirty-two; eighty plus thirty-two…one-twelve.   _

Across the field figures appear, slowing at first to survey the surroundings, cautiously so they don’t somehow offend the Argents and cause an all out brawl. They know they’re outnumbered and likely outmatched. They speed up again, seemingly deciding it’s safe enough to do so, until they’re about thirty or forty feet away from the Argents. 

Two guys and a girl, one of the guys being flanked by the other two in an approximation of a triangle, establishing him as the leader. He grins, and though the expression itself isn’t inherently sharp or intimidating, it is on him. His blue eyes flick over everyone, not settling for too long on anyone in particular.

Stiles controls his breathing, gripping Lydia’s hand hard enough it would hurt if she were human. 

_ Four times twelve? Shit, always hated twelves, four times ten, forty; four times two, eight; forty-eight.  _

“At first, we thought it was thunder.” The guy says conversationally, his voice light, humorous, and completely unintimidating. “Clearly, we were wrong.” 

“Well, then you see our need for it.” Victoria says, equally as casual and light.

Calm settles over Stiles, completely unexpectedly. It takes him a moment to realize it’s coming from Chris, who must be implementing his gift and diffusing any tension in the field. Stiles would be lying if he said he wasn’t grateful for the assist. 

The other two vampires are entirely different from the first, slightly crouched and tensed whereas he’s upright and languid; unconcerned, even. The other guy has a dark complexion with dark, wavy hair and equally dark eyes that seem almost fathomless. The girl is waifish, thin and tall with long dark hair and tanned skin. Her eyes flick between faces almost anxiously.

“Indeed.” The guy says, “My name is Theo, and this is Donovan,” He points a thumb over his shoulder at the other guy, “And that’s Tracey.” He tilts his head in the direction of the girl.

“I’m Victoria.” Victoria informs them, “This is my family, Chris, Allison, and Isaac, Stiles and Lydia, and Jackson.” She groups them together, drawing attention only to Jackson, the only single one in the group--and likely the most intimidating one of them, after Victoria herself, who’s intentionally trying not to be. 

“Do you have room for a few extra players?” Theo asks, his eyes looking curious, flicking over the bows in their hands. 

“Yes, actually.” Victoria says, “A few of us were just leaving, you can take their places.” 

“We’ll do our best to keep up, then.” Tracey says, smirking, losing all of her anxiety and standing upright in a moment. 

Isaac laughs, “I’ll hold you to it.” He snarks and Theo grins, apparently enjoying the challenge. 

They each turn to continue the game and then several things happen very quickly. 

A light breeze rifles through Stiles’ hair and everyone in the field goes rigid except for Donovan, who sneers and growls from behind his teeth. 

“You brought a snack.” He says simply, perverse excitement twisting his face into a gross approximation of a grin. Too feral, too sharp, too  _ dangerous  _ to be anything close to a smile. 

He crouches and Lydia responds in kind, mimicking the motion and snarling. Nothing like what it had sounded like in her bedroom, no, this sound is  _ terrifying,  _ completely animal and yet so human he can hear her voice in it. A chill races from the top of his head to his heels and he’s suddenly glad it’s not him it’s pointed at. 

“He’s with us.” Victoria says, hard and impassible. Donovan doesn’t even spare her a glance, his gaze trained solely on Stiles, who can’t look away from his eerily dark eyes. 

“But he’s  _ human.” _ Theo protests, brows furrowed in genuine confusion. 

“I said, he’s with us.” Victoria enunciates, each word dripping with authority. Jackson shifts minutely until he’s in front of Stiles. Stiles would be surprised, would even want to protest, or something but he can’t. He can’t feel anything but sheer, gripping, terror staring straight into Donovan’s eyes. 

For the longest time, he hadn’t understood it. Why had the creatures he’s beginning to know been the inspiration for horror flicks and scary stories? They’re hardly anything terrifying at all, hardly worthy of note beyond their complete  _ otherness,  _ and even then, it’s only notable because of how beautiful they are. 

But now, faced with a natural predator, someone who completely embraces the animalistic aspects of himself, Stiles understands. There is nothing-- _ nothing-- _ more terrifying than looking into the eyes of something that wants you dead. 

“I see that things have changed.” Theo says cautiously, backing away from the Argents, avoiding a defensive posture. “We’ll be going now. Of course, we won’t be harming the human.” He cuts a significant look to Donovan, who still hasn’t broken eye contact with Stiles. 

“Yes, I think that would be wise.” Allison says, her voice hard. Her posture’s unconcerned and loose, but Stiles knows she’s anything but. 

“Donovan.” Theo says, his voice leaving no room for argument, and Donovan straightens out of his crouch, his nostrils still flared and eyes still dark and uncanny and fixed on Stiles.

Lydia stays right where she is, and Jackson moves forward slightly more, creating a wall of vampire between them and Stiles. 

The trio back slowly away until they’re around a hundred feet away and then run, blurs across the same green backdrop. 

Lydia straightens and starts hauling him out of the field at a half jog, which leaves Stiles trying to figure out where his feet should go until they’re at the edge of the trees and she hauls him up onto her back. He doesn’t have time to be concerned about embarrassment because she takes off without waiting for him to fully climb on, gripping his arms around her neck with force. 

When they reach the jeep Lydia lifts him into it like he weighs nothing and tells Isaac--who Stiles hadn’t even noticed was with them--to buckle him in. Jackson sits in the passenger seat and Lydia starts the car and drives before he’s even fully in his seat. Stiles attempts to brace himself for the ride back but can’t do much of anything through the shock. 

_ Oh my god,  _ He thinks,  _ oh my  _ **_fucking_ ** _ god.  _

“Lydia.” He says, his voice reedy even to his own ears. 

“We can talk in a minute.” She promises just as they start to go over the first of the bumps. 

It takes a long time for the ground to level out again, made even longer by the yelling in his head, the steady buzz of panic that’s slowly saturated every thought in his head. 

“Lydia.” He tries again. 

“Stiles, I’m so sorry.” Lydia starts but he cuts her off before she can gain steam. 

“Where are we going?” 

“Away.” She says, “As far away as we can get you.” It sounds like a promise. 

“What? Lydia, I don’t understand. I have to go home.” Stiles insists, speaking slowly, feeling like he’s trying to speak through a fog in his brain, like panic is hazing out the world around him. 

“You can’t.” She says. 

“What? I don’t--I don’t understand.” He flounders. 

“Lydia.” Isaac says, almost gently. 

“No.” She hisses at him, the sound harsh and unyielding. 

“Lydia, pull over.” Isaac tries again, his voice pleading but insistent. 

_ “No.”  _ Lydia shouts. “You don’t  _ understand,  _ he’s a tracker, I saw it.” 

“Lydia, we have to think this through.” Isaac says, his voice adamant. 

“There isn’t anything to  _ think about,”  _ She shouts, “He’s made up his mind, he had the plan set before Theo even finished  _ talking.  _ There is nothing we can do but  _ get him out.”  _

“But I have to go home.” Stiles tries again, his stomach bottoming out for an entirely new reason, “Lydia, I  _ have to go home,  _ my dad is there.” 

“You can’t go home.” She says and Stiles snaps, the panic finally bleeding way into nearly blinding anger. 

“I don’t actually care whether or not you think I can, I  _ have to  _ because, as I previously stated,  _ my dad is there.”  _ He nearly shouts at her. 

“You don’t understand, Stiles.” Lydia replies, voice tight with anger, “He’s  _ set  _ on you, you’re his target and oh, he loves a challenge.” She spits bitterly, “And I,” She laughs, a cruel, disquieting sound, “I protected you. I just made this the most challenging round yet.” 

“Lydia,  _ pull over!”  _ Isaac shouts and Lydia growls at him, the sound ripping from her throat. 

“I’m not leaving him!” Stiles shouts. “I won’t leave my dad! Not after everything.” 

The car slows minutely. 

“We just have to think this through.” Isaac coaxes and the car slows more noticeably until she slams to a stop on the shoulder of the highway. 

“What do you want me to do, Isaac? Lead him straight back into harm’s way? Right into his hands?” Lydia snaps. 

“Yes.” Isaac says simply. 

Lydia snarls, “No.” 

“We have to take him back.” Jackson says, speaking for the first time. Stiles’ head whips to him, thinking him the least likely ally considering everything. 

“ _ No!”  _ Lydia shrieks. 

“He’s no match for us, Lyd, not even close.” 

“He’ll wait until we leave him alone.” 

“We won’t leave him alone.” Isaac promises her. 

“We’d have to kill him.” Lydia seethes.

“Yes.” Jackson agrees, completely unbothered by the prospect. 

“The girl, she’s with him, his…sister, almost.” Lydia asserts, “And if it becomes a fight-- _ and it will-- _ Theo will side with them, too.” 

“Numbers are still in our favour.” Jackson points out mildly. 

“I  _ will not  _ put him in danger like that.” Lydia repeats. 

“Do you wanna hear my plan?” Stiles finally interrupts. 

“No.” She snaps at him but Stiles is nothing if not stubborn. 

“We turn around--” 

 “NO!” Lydia practically roars. 

“Yes!” Stiles shouts back, refusing to be cowed, “We go back, I tell my dad what’s going on, over text or something so that I can tell him something else.” He pauses, realising that doesn’t make sense, but his brain is starting to come back online with the promise of a plan, one that he has control over, “I mean, he’ll be listening in, won’t he?” He doesn’t have to clarify that he’s asking about Donovan and receives resounding silence, “So I can’t clue my dad in like that, I have to make sure he knows though, because I _ will not  _ be  _ lying  _ to my dad. But I still have to make Donovan think I’ve given him a cover story so that he thinks my dad won’t know where I’m going.” 

“No, it’s too dangerous.”

“You literally didn’t listen to a word I just said.” Stiles seethes. “I’m not going  _ alone,  _ you guys will be with me the whole time, but we can’t just leave without telling him anything, he’ll send out a search party for me, cause trouble for your family,  _ something. _ I have to make sure Donovan leaves him alone,  _ I have to,  _ Lydia.” 

She sits and massages her temples for a moment. 

“It takes too long, you have no idea if he’ll let you go or not. We don’t have time for that kind of charade.” Lydia says and puts her hands back on the steering wheel. 

“He won’t attack.” Isaac says, his eyes closed, “He goes around problems, not through them. He knows he’s no match for all of us. He’ll wait until Stiles is alone.” He reminds her.

Lydia snarls. “Fifteen minutes,  _ total.”  _ She warns Stiles, who melts into his seat with relief, feeling light-headed with the force of it. “In and out, stuff packed,  _ everything,  _ do you understand?” 

“Perfectly.” Stiles breathes, and pulls out his phone to compose the text of a lifetime. He’s planning to send it the second he walks in the door--

Wait, what if Donovan somehow gets ahold of his phone? Then he’d know Stiles’ dad knows and then he’d be a target again--

No, that’s stupid, how would Donovan even get Stiles’ phone? 

He tries,  _ desperately,  _ to scrape together some kind of cognizance so he can actually get through all that he needs to say. 

_ Dad, I’ve just walked in, and I know I look like shit so just read this and I’ll try to explain everything.  _ There, that seems like an okay opener,  _ Don’t say anything, don’t act like anything is wrong, just follow my lead. I’m gonna have to call you later and actually explain everything fully, but this is gonna have to do for now. Dad, I NEED you to believe me. I know this is gonna sound impossible and like I’m joking or trying to pull one over on you but I swear on mom’s mug I’m telling you the truth.  _ It’s harsh, but he needs his dad to believe him, minimal questions asked, and this is the way to do it.

_ Lydia is a vampire, her whole family is. And I know you’ve noticed, you’re a cop for a reason. Things are weird about them, you know I’m right. And I’ll explain everything more as soon as I can I promise. So the thing is that I’m in danger, like a lot of danger. And I’m trying to make sure that you aren’t in danger too. I’m gonna come home and tell you something, I haven’t figured out what yet, but it’s probably gonna be total bullshit. I have to leave town for a while, get the danger away from you and away from my friends. I have to. I’m sorry.  _

He stares down at his phone and blinks away the stinging in his eyes. 

_ I’ll call you as soon as I’m far enough away. I don’t know how long that will take, less than twelve hours though. At least one of the Argents is gonna stay in town to protect you and the others. And a few are coming with me too. I’m gonna be ok, I swear to god I’ll be ok. I won’t leave you.  _

Stiles blinks and a tear lands on the screen of his phone. He wipes it away and squeezes his eyes shut. 

He locks his phone and shoves it in his pocket, knowing he can’t send the text until he’s walking up to the house. He has to make sure it doesn’t send on accident and that it gets to his dad the moment it needs to. 

He looks up and sees they’re already back in town. His heart jumps into his throat and he has to clamp his jaw shut against the sound that wants to escape him. He doesn’t even know what it’s gonna be, only that he doesn’t want anyone around him to hear it. 

A warm hand falls onto his shoulder and Stiles turns to look at Isaac. He looks apologetic but determined and he squeezes Stiles’ shoulder gently. Stiles nods and wipes another few tears away as they fall. 

They turn onto his street and his hands curl into fists, his nails digging into his palms, trying to ground himself enough to pull this off. 

He takes a deep breath, and then another. He squeezes his eyes shut. 

_ Get it the fuck together. You don’t have a fucking choice, this is about dad, not you. Focus up, mother fucker.  _

Stiles reaches deep within himself and shoves his panic there, puts a lid on it and promises the lid--and previous therapists--that he’ll deal with it the second he can. 

After that he feels numb, like whatever happens now doesn’t bother him at all. He chooses to ignore how unsettling that is, and conversely, how nice it feels. 

The monster vehicle has barely rolled to a stop by the time Stiles is falling out of it, yanking his phone out of his pocket and sending the text with increasingly numb fingers. 

He watches the screen until he steps onto the porch and throws the door open, infinitely glad his dad left it unlocked for him. 

Stiles slams the door behind him and his dad looks up from the TV, frowning. His phone is in his hand and Stiles nods. 

“I have to leave.” Stiles says, his brain working furiously to come up with a plan, “I’m just…stuck, dad.” Is what he finally settles on. 

He jerks his head in the direction of the stairs and his dad catches his drift, and stands to follow him. Stiles tries not to rush up the stairs, fully aware of his time limit and how fucking  _ impossible  _ it’ll be to get his dad to let him go. 

“What do you mean?” His dad says behind him and Stiles spins to see that he’s confused, but not angry. Definitely disbelieving. But not angry. 

“I’m…” He flounders. His dad comes to his rescue, like he always does. 

“I know it’s been an adjustment,” He starts and Stiles almost breaks down right there because  _ yes, that’s exactly what I need. _

“And we knew it was gonna be.” Stiles says, moving into his bedroom to pack, his dad right behind him. He doesn’t pay any attention to what he’s putting in the duffle that had been stashed under his bed, just shoves the first thing he touches from each drawer into it. He has no idea where he’s going or for how long, so it’s not like he’d know what to bring even if he did have more time to be selective. 

“But it’s just too much. The rain and the--the clouds, it’s fucking depressing, dad, and I just need to go, just for a little while.” Stiles says, looking up at his dad, pleading with him. His dad looks down at his phone, rereading. Stiles keeps packing, even shoving past his dad to get to the bathroom and pack random toiletries. 

“Where are you gonna go?” His dad asks, concerned and incredulous, playing along but also probably just wondering. Outside of the tale they’re currently spinning, Stiles has no idea. 

“Home.” He says, and even he knows how fake it sounds. Beacon Hills isn’t home anymore, but he can’t give Donovan a real location, “I’ll stay with Heather, I’ll call you when I get there.” 

“Why don’t you sleep on it, Stiles, see how you feel in the morning.” His dad suggests and Stiles whirls on him, already preparing to somehow silently convey  _ no that it definitely not happening.  _

But his dad is shaking his head, making eye contact and then spinning his hand through the air in a gesture urging Stiles to continue packing. Stiles practically collapses with relief. 

“No, I have to go now, I wanna drive.” Stiles says, his voice wavering for the first time and he takes a deep breath, already feeling the tumultuous control he’d exerted over himself wearing off. “I’ll stop if I get tired, I swear.” 

His dad’s head swivels back and forth before he yanks Stiles to his chest. 

“You had better call me in twelve hours.” His dad whispers into his shoulder, so quiet Stiles is almost shocked he hears it. He looks around and sees that, from where they are in the hall, no windows look in on them. He exhales in a rush and clings to his dad, taking any and all strength he can get from him. He nods emphatically, automatically agreeing that no matter what the hell happens, he’ll be calling his dad in twelve hours. 

“I just need some sun.” Stiles says, keeping up with the charade, starting to feel a lump forming in his throat. He pulls away from his dad before he can get too wrapped up. 

“Okay. If you’re sure.” His dad says, sounding unconvinced, but nodding to Stiles. 

And Stiles heads down the stairs, grabs his car keys by the door, and puts his hand on the handle, ready to yank it open. But he can’t. 

He turns to look at his dad and can see the worry in every inch of his face. 

And just then Stiles almost breaks. He almost insists they take his dad with them, almost drops his bag and runs back into his dad’s arms, almost stomps his foot and cries  _ it’s not fair! _

But he knows that every minute he wastes here puts his dad in even more danger. He has to  _ move.  _

“I’ll call you.” Stiles promises, hearing how tight his voice sounds but completely unable to stop it. 

“Okay.” His dad says, “Be safe.” 

Stiles has to bite his lip to keep from screaming. 

_ Be safe. _

He’s trying. 

“You too.” Stiles says, and after his dad nods, he pulls the door open and descends the steps, pushing away the thought that this could be the last time he sees this house. 

He doesn’t look back. 

He won’t leave if he does. 

Stiles throws his duffel into the passenger seat when he climbs into his jeep and turns the engine over, peeling out of the driveway with far less care than normal. 

Lydia pops up from his backseat and he jumps with a whispered, “Jesus, Lydia _. _ ” __

She climbs into his lap and puts her foot on the pedal. He catches on and awkwardly slides over to the passenger seat, pushing his bag onto the ground. 

“Was he there?” He murmurs, afraid of the answer. 

“Yes.” Lydia says. One of the back doors opens and Stiles has a scream already at the back of his throat before Lydia clamps a hand over his mouth. “Just Jackson.” She clarifies and, sure enough, Jackson gracefully eases into the moving car and shuts the door behind himself. 

Stiles glances at the speedometer to see they’re currently going seventy, pushing his jeep to its limit. 

“We caught the girl’s scent, she’s heading in the opposite direction, we’re not sure what she’s doing.” Jackson informs Lydia, “Isaac can’t get a read on her, she’s probably following orders, not making decisions on her own.”  

“Great.” Lydia mutters.

“The tracker is heading south, Chris and Victoria are following him.” Jackson continues, “The plan is to have Stiles switch clothes with me and we’ll leave a trail in the opposite direction of where he’s headed.” 

Stiles wrinkles his nose at the concept of swapping clothes with Jackson, for so many reasons and looks back to see Jackson scowling for probably similar reasons. 

“Where am I going?” Stiles asks and Jackson shakes his head. Right. Big brother is watching. 

Lydia takes a left way too fast and Stiles grabs onto the dashboard to steady himself as they turn onto the dirt road leading to her house. He sees the monstrous jeep in the driveway and he realises he’d completely forgotten about it. Clearly it had been driven back here while he was still inside with his dad. 

Lydia barely stops the car before she’s out of it and at his door, pulling him bodily out of the car and into the house. 

Jackson follows them in with Stiles’ duffel in hand and the consideration in the act kinda shocks Stiles for a second. But he doesn’t have time to dwell on it because there’s someone else in the foyer. 

Theo stands with Isaac and Allison, a distance away but obviously conversing with them. Lydia shoves Stiles behind her and crouches with a snarl. 

Theo’s hands go up instantly and Isaac rushes to explain. 

“He came to warn us.” He says and Theo keeps his hands where they are, all the smirking humor Stiles had seen in the field gone now, replaced by solemnity. 

“He’s tracking us.” Lydia spits and Theo frowns.

“I thought he might be.” He says simply. 

“What will he do?” Jackson asks him even though they already have a fairly solid idea, thanks to Lydia. It’s never a bad thing to have more information. 

“Your red-head set him off,” Theo says, “When she defended him.”

“Can you stop him?” Lydia snarls and Theo shakes his head, still cowed by Lydia’s protective anger. 

“Nothing can stop Donovan when he has his target.” He explains and Stiles’ stomach plummets to his toes. 

“We’ll stop him.” Allison promises, her eyes hard and cold. 

Theo’s eyes flit between faces, resting just slightly longer on Stiles’ with furrowed brows, “You can’t. I’ve never seen anything like him as long as I’ve lived. He’s savage, lethal. It’s why I joined his coven.” 

Stiles wants to smack himself. Of course it hadn’t been Theo’s coven, if it had been, they wouldn’t be having this problem. 

“Are you sure this is worth all of this?” Theo asks, his eyes landing on Stiles again, confusion evident on his face. Lydia growls. 

“You’re going to have to choose.” Isaac says simply, his gaze fixed on Theo but distant, probably surveying his future. 

Theo tears his gaze from Stiles and looks at Isaac. “This life intrigues me.” He answers, “But I won’t step in. I don’t have any problems with any of you, but I won’t act against Donovan.” He pauses. “Do not underestimate him. He’s ruthless, his senses unmatched, and he’s smart. He’s just as comfortable in the human world as you seem to be despite how he looks. And Tracey is stronger and faster than she looks. I’ve never seen anyone fight like she does.” 

He looks back at Stiles. “I’m sorry. I hope this ends with survivors.” 

Stiles shudders. 

“Go in peace.” Allison says and Theo’s a blur, leaving the front door open behind him. 

The silence following him doesn’t last as Victoria and Chris rush in just seconds after he leaves. 

“How close?” Lydia asks. 

“About three miles out.” Chris answers, “Meeting up with the girl, from what we can tell.” 

“As soon as we get Stiles clear we hunt him.” Victoria says, her face solemn but her voice hard, leaving no room for questions. 

Lydia nods, then hands Stiles off to Jackson, who gets him in a fireman carry and takes him up the stairs into Chris and Victoria’s study. 

Jackson sets him down then pulls his own jacket off and then tugs his shirt over his head. Stiles can’t help but stare for a second because the guy is fucking  _ ripped,  _ which makes him think of Heather and he has to hold in the absolutely hysteric giggle that tries to bubble to the surface. 

_ That’s it, we’ve finally cracked. And all it took was a shirtless vampire.  _

“Well come on, then, we don’t have all night.” Jackson snaps and Stiles fumbles his way out of his clothes, handing them over to Jackson and trying _ \--desperately-- _ to ignore the fact that he’s both stripping to his underwear in front of the hottest guy he’s ever seen in real life and that that guy is  _ the hottest guy he’s ever seen in real life  _ and also the equivalent of his brother-in-law. 

_ Yup, we’re fuckin’ nuts.  _ His brain expresses and Stiles  _ begs _ it to shut the fuck up. 

Once he’s dressed in Jackson’s clothes--which fit, but not well--and Jackson’s dressed in his--which definitely don’t fit--they head down to the garage, Stiles once again thrown over Jackson’s shoulder. He would object but he simply doesn’t have it in him. 

There the Argents are packing up a car with duffel bags and Jackson throws Stiles’ bag into the trunk as well. 

Stiles stands in the most bizarre combination of panic and awkwardness. Isaac comes up next to him and leads him to the car with a hand on his shoulder. 

“Jackson’s gonna take your car, lead the tracker away.” Isaac explains and Stiles nods, numb. “Allison and I will take you south, as far as we can get you--”

“No!” Lydia shouts, “I’m not leaving him.” 

“Lydia,” Victoria says, “He’ll know you won’t leave him, he’ll follow you. You’ll put him in more danger.” 

Lydia looks pained. “I can’t leave him, mama.” She whispers miserably and Victoria looks stricken. She pulls Lydia to her. 

“You have to.” She says into Lydia’s hair. “You do not have a choice.” Stiles is frozen, wanting to help, but knowing there’s absolutely nothing he can do. 

Lydia pulls away and turns to pack a hiking pack, roughly as big as she is. Stiles almost doesn’t want to know what’s in it. 

He stands next to the car with Isaac and stares after her.

Allison comes up next to him and takes his hand. “We’ll keep you safe.” She swears and Stiles nods, unable to do anything else. He doesn’t doubt them for a second, he knows he’s safe with them. 

Lydia appears in front of him and Allison and Isaac find somewhere else to be. She pulls him down by the collar of Jackson’s jacket and his hands are already tangled in her hair by the time her lips are on his. She grips his shirt in one hand and scrapes her nails against his scalp with the other, sending sparks down the back of his neck, her fingers pulling slightly at his hair. 

Then she breaks away, her eyes gleaming. 

“I love you.” She says tightly and Stiles grips the back of her sweatshirt, his hand clenching in the fabric without him telling it to. 

“I love you too.” He croaks. 

“I will come find you.” She vows and Stiles nods. She reluctantly tries to leave the circle of his arms and he straightens, but can’t bring himself to let go. Lydia looks up at him and begs him with her eyes--either to keep hold or let go he can’t tell. He makes the wise decision and releases her. 

“I know.” Stiles whispers. 

Chris lays a hand on Lydia’s shoulder. 

“Stiles,” Victoria says and Stiles turns to her, “I’m going to remain here, to protect your father. Chris, Jackson, and Lydia will hunt the tracker, and as soon as they’ve finished Allison and Isaac will bring you back. This is not forever, Stiles.” She promises and he nods, his voice having left him already. 

It’s starting to seem like everyone is promising him things but no one can offer any certainties. The thought makes him miserable. 

How did it come to this? 

“Isaac, will they take the bait?” Chris asks. Everyone is silent while Isaac closes his eyes.

The seconds stretch like taffy and Stiles feels sick. 

“He’ll track you. The girl will follow Jackson. We’ll be able to leave after that.” Isaac declares. He sounds certain. 

“Let’s go.” Chris says and heads out of the garage with Jackson and Victoria on his heels. Lydia hangs back. 

She picks up Stiles hand and lays it against her cheek, her glittering eyes staring straight into his, her face screwed up in near-anguish. 

He doesn’t know what to say. Neither does she. 

Then she takes a step away from him, and then another until his hand drops and she disappears, the garage door swinging behind her. 

Stiles bites his lip and brings his arms up around himself. 

He hears his jeep starting upstairs and then they’re gone. 

It feels like someone has ripped some part of him open and he’s standing there bleeding in the garage of people he’s known less than twelve hours. 

He squeezes his eyes shut, but tears still roll silently down his cheeks. 

They wait. Isaac keeps his eyes closed. 

“She’s following Jackson.” He finally says, breaking the silence. “Let’s go.” 

Allison offers Stiles her hand and he takes it. She pulls him to the car and deposits him in the backseat, buckling his seat belt before darting around the car and sliding into the passenger seat just as Isaac starts driving. 

They leave the lights on behind them. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> to quote my best friend and editor: we in it now boys


	16. This Will Be my Last Confession; I Love You Never Felt Like Any Blessing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> brief description of panic throughout, but nothing too graphic. i'll fill you in down there if you want to skip it

When Stiles wakes up he can’t figure out where he is. It’s dark, but he’s lying in a bed, the sheets scratchy and unfamiliar. 

Then everything starts flooding back, the tracker, running for his life, Lydia going after the tracker and in danger. 

He sits bolt upright and sucks in a breath like a gasp. “Shit.” He breathes and untangles himself from the sheets. _How long has he been asleep?_

Stiles fumbles around the dark room for his phone and when he has hold of it he can see missed texts from Heather and Scott and Kira and he ignores them when he sees the time; just shy of twelve hours after leaving his house. His throat tightens. 

He calls his dad. 

“Stiles, you’re late.” His dad says by way of greeting and Stiles cringes. 

“I know. I think I fell asleep.” Stiles says. 

“You better have the world’s greatest explanation for this shit, Stiles.” His dad says and Stiles is taken aback. His father rarely swears in front of him. 

“Okay so, basically, vampires are real.” Stiles starts, “And I’m kind of dating one?” 

“How long have you known?” His dad bites out. 

“Confirmed? Since Tuesday." _Was it really only Tuesday?_ "But I’ve suspected something was up since the car accident.” Stiles says. 

“Since _February?”_ His dad accuses. 

Stiles winces, “It sounded crazy, I _felt_ crazy,” He tells him, “How was I supposed to tell you about it? _I_ didn’t even wanna know about it.” 

Stiles can almost see his dad rubbing the heel of his palm against his forehead. 

“Stiles, this is insane.” His dad says. 

“I know.” Stiles says, “But I couldn’t lie to you, especially not if you were gonna be in danger.” 

His dad sighs. “Are you okay?”

Stiles gives a weak chuckle, “Physically? Yeah. I’m in a hotel, I think, I’m not sure where yet but I’ll let you know when I find out. Otherwise? I have no idea.” He admits. 

There’s silence on the other end, and Stiles wishes he could fix it. But he’s just as lost. 

“Are you safe?” His father finally asks. 

Stiles lets out a breath. “Yes. Isaac and Allison are right outside. They won’t let anything hurt me. The rest of them are after to guy that’s after me and Dr. Argent is staying in town with you. She won’t let anything past her.” He promises. 

“I’m not worried about me.” His dad says and Stiles feels it like a punch, “I’m worried that you’ve gotten yourself into something you can’t get out of.” His voice is tight. 

Stiles gnaws on his lip. “I know.” He says pathetically, because there’s nothing he _can_ say. Because his dads not wrong. He has absolutely gotten himself into something he can't get out of.

“Jesus, Stiles, you have got to promise to stay safe.” His dad says, his voice wavering, “I want constant contact, updates on where you are, texts before you go to sleep, when you wake up, _constant.”_ His dad demands and Stiles nods immediately even though he knows his dad can’t see, “If you don’t text me within fifteen minutes of me texting you I _will_ assume the worst. Do not make me assume the worst, Stiles.” 

“Absolutely.” Stiles agrees, “Updates, texts, phone calls, everything. I swear it.” 

“Don’t swear to me.” His dad says and Stiles sucks in a breath. 

It takes a moment for him to swallow past the rapidly forming lump in his throat. 

“I swear to mom.” Stiles says, glancing around his room. He doesn’t expect her to hear it, doesn’t even know if he believes she’s anywhere at all. But if she is, he _swears_ to her that he’ll get back to his dad. Hell or high water. 

“Okay.” His dad says, his voice thick. Stiles blinks away the stinging in his eyes. 

“Okay.” Stiles says, equally as emotional. _Jesus fucking Christ how did this happen?_

“For the love of God, be safe.” His dad demands, “I fucking mean it, Stiles.” 

Stiles starts at his language again, but nods to the empty air. “I will.” 

His dad hangs up and Stiles understands why. 

He can’t stand to say ‘goodbye’ either, even if it’s only to hang up the phone. 

Stiles sits on the bed and doesn’t do anything for a while. He doesn’t even know how long, he just sits there, staring into the darkness and trying not to think or cry or scream. He sinks his teeth into his lip because if he even opens his mouth he’ll lose it. 

There’s a soft knock on the door and Allison dips her head in. 

“Hey.” She says softly and Stiles nods, unable to say anything. “I’ve got breakfast.” 

Stiles’ stomach growls and he wants to protest it, tell it there’s absolutely no way he can eat anything around this fucking lump in his throat but he knows he has to. _Be safe._

He hauls himself out of bed and barely spares a thought for the fact that he’s still wearing Jackson’s clothes. 

Allison holds the door open for him and he stumbles into the dark living room. Ah, a suite then. 

A sliver of sunlight peaks through a slit in the curtains and as Allison walks past it her cheek and the side of her neck flare. 

Stiles sits on the couch next to Isaac, who looks like he’s watching the early morning talk show currently occupying the TV screen, but his eyes are familiarly distant. He must be watching the future. 

Isaac blinks and offers Stiles a warm smile. 

“Hey,” He says, “You sleep okay?” 

Stiles shrugs noncommittally. He doesn’t actually know if he did or not. 

“You should eat something.” Isaac insists, “If Lydia finds out you didn’t eat she’d flay me alive.” 

Stiles nods and reaches for the tray of room service. He eats mechanically, not tasting a bite. He checks his phone and sees he must have only been staring into space for a few minutes at most. 

 _Still ok._ He texts his dad. 

“How are they?” He asks Isaac. Isaac shrugs. 

“They led the tracker and the girl up into Canada, last update we got. Everyone’s alright, it hasn’t turned into a fight.” He explains, and though he doesn’t say ‘yet’, Stiles can hear it in the resounding silence. 

He tries to be comforted by the knowledge that Lydia’s okay, that everyone’s okay. 

He checks the texts from his friends. Scott and Kira are asking after him, since it’s Monday morning and he’s not at school. 

 _I’m ok, I just don’t feel well._ He sends back to both of them and Kira sends him a _Oh, well, hope you feel better soon!_ And Scott comes back with a similar sentiment with _What’d you do over the weekend? We missed you at the dance_ tacked on at the end. A corner of Stiles’ mouth twitches at that. The normalcy of talking to his friend is starting to calm him down. 

He doesn’t really want to get into what he did with his weekend with Scott, so he resorts instead to distraction. _How was prom dude? Dance with Kira at all??_

He switches conversations and thanks Kira for the well wishes and then over again to Heather. 

 _Heres the thing, since you didnt text me last night, im forced to assume that you had sex with her, in which case: SPILL._ Heather’s texted him. He snorts, drawing Allison and Isaac’s questioning glances. 

“Nothing, just my friend.” He explains, his voice still kind of rough. 

He goes back to his phone. _Didn’t have sex with her you perv. I just got home late and didn’t text you. You know there are other things in my life besides you right? Like, for instance, sleep._

His phone buzzes with a text from his dad that says, _Where are you?_

“Hey, where are we?” Stiles asks Isaac, the ever dutiful son. 

“Just north of San Diego.” He answers and Stiles frowns. They shouldn’t be that far south with less than twelve hours of driving. Isaac must guess at what he’s thinking because he grins. 

“I drive fast.” He says by way of explanation and Stiles cocks his head, considering. _Well, alright, makes sense._

His phone buzzes and he sees texts from Scott and Heather.

Scott has a novel length description of prom. 

Heather’s is the most entertaining of the two, of course, _Did you tell cheekbones i said hi?_

He answers his dad first with _North of San Diego._

Then he reads over Scott’s publishing-length text and gleans that, essentially, he had a good time, got to dance with Kira, and kissed her at the end of the night. Stiles congratulates him appropriately and starts to feel the last of the lingering panic melt away. 

To Heather he says, _I told you I wouldn’t._

 _Youre a terrible friend._ She says back, _Dont you want me to get laid?_

 _I don’t wanna think about you getting laid, like, ever._ He tells her. 

 _Ok but you can agree hes hot right?_ She presses and Stiles rolls his eyes. 

_I do have eyes._

_Oh good, I was starting to worry._

He finally manages an actual smile and Isaac chuckles. 

“She’s an interesting one.” Isaac says and Stiles starts to ask how he knows who he’s talking to or how he knows anything about her, but remembers the fact that Isaac can literally see the future. 

“What do you see about her?” Stiles asks and Isaac’s gaze slides to the right. 

“She’s…spunky.” He says and Stiles chuckles. “Kind of rude. She continues to make gross comments about Jackson, by the way.” 

Stiles snorts. “Yeah, that was never an uncertainty.” Isaac chuckles. 

Stiles thinks of something Isaac had said yesterday.

“When we first meet, you were really excited to see me, hell, it seemed like you were, like, familiar.” Stiles says. Isaac laughs. 

“Yeah, I guess that would lead to a few questions, huh?” He grins. “Basically, time moves differently for me. I see things both in the present and the future, right? So to me, we’ve both just met and been friends for years.” 

“Woah.” Is all Stiles can conjure up. 

Isaac chuckles. “Yeah, that’s a predictable response. It’s weird, that my sister happened to fall in love with my best friend. Guess I owe her one for that, huh?” 

Stiles blinks at him and Isaac laughs again. 

“You don’t have to have an eloquent response for that.” Isaac says and Stiles nods dumbly. 

“Good, because I really don’t.” 

“You can ask, you know, I’ll probably answer.” Isaac tells him as Stiles has the thought to ask him about his story. Stiles knows the reason Isaac has his precognition, but he doesn’t know the circumstances of his death. Or, well, _almost_ death.

“Okay,” Stiles says slowly, “How did you become a vampire?” 

Allison chimes in. “I turned him.” She sits on the coffee table in front of them and demurely crosses legs. 

Stiles looks over at her, “You did?”  

She smiles at him, dimples out full force. 

“Yes. I was his nurse during the Civil War.” She explains, glancing over at Isaac. “He got quite acquainted with a confederate bayonet in the worst possible way. He wasn’t going to live through the night, and even he knew it.” 

“Well, I wouldn’t say I _knew,”_ Isaac puts in, “I suspected.” 

Allison rolls her eyes. 

“But what made you change him?” Stiles asks, realising it’s probably a prying question but unable to stop the words once he thinks of them. 

“It was a couple of things.” She says, looking down at her hands. “His hair’s curly. It…reminded me of one of the children I had looked after when I was human.” It sounds like an admission. Stiles looks over at Isaac, who watches his wife with undeniable love in his eyes. 

“And as he was laying there, on his death bed, he had the audacity to flirt with me.” She chuckles and Stiles smiles despite the situation, thinking that that feels very in character for the man sitting next to him. 

“I’d like to say I was successful.” Isaac points out and Allison laughs. 

“Well I’m here now, aren’t I?” She teases and Isaac looks at her with enough adoration that Stiles feels like he’s intruding. He looks down at his phone and shoots another proof-of-life text to his dad. 

“What the hell did he say?” Stiles can’t help but ask. 

“He asked me if I was an angel.” Allison rolls her eyes but Stiles can see how soft her expression is. 

“And, of course, she told me she wasn’t.” Isaac says.

“And he said to me, ‘if you’re guarding the gates of hell, I don’t mind stayin’ a while’.” 

Stiles laughs. 

“I can’t believe that worked.” Stiles can’t help but say. Isaac laughs. 

“Believe me, I was just as surprised as you are,” He says, “I mean, I barely even remember saying it.” 

“That’s why it worked,” Allison says, and something about the way she says it makes Stiles think that they’ve probably had this conversation before, “You were so genuine. You sincerely meant what you said.” She shrugs elegantly, “It was…nice to hear, at the time.” 

Her expression morphs to one of profound sadness and Stiles wants to ask, but they’ve already been so forthcoming, he doesn’t want to push. 

“What is it?” Allison asks and Stiles looks up at her to see her looking at Isaac, whose eyes had gone distant again. 

“You know,” Isaac says, turning to Stiles, “You don’t have to keep censoring yourself. Whatever else happens, you’re family now.” His tone is serious. Stiles is almost taken aback by it, and he’s definitely taken aback by the assertion that he’s family. He’d guessed half as much, even if only subconsciously, with his commitment to Lydia. 

“You can just ask.” Isaac finishes and Stiles looks over at Allison. 

“What happened to you?” Stiles asks, noting a pattern between the Argents and near death experiences. 

She smiles sadly at him and picks at a non-existent thread on her jeans. “1836.” She says and Stiles tries to keep his expression neutral but he can’t. Her lips twitch as she continues, “I’d just been married.”

“Lydia said you’d been married.” Stiles says and Allison flashes him a quick smile. 

“It’s generous to say as much.” She says, and Stiles waits for her to explain. “I’d only been married a few months before he died.” 

Stiles’ chest tightens. He doesn’t know what to say, even for a pain as old as hers.

“He was the only person I had. My parents had died when I was young, and I didn’t have any friends. It’s extremely lonely, being a governess.” She says, “You’re above the other servants but below your employers. No one who doesn’t resent you or disrespect you.”

“I’m sorry.” Stiles finally says. She smiles softly at him. 

“It was a long time ago.” She says, mostly to herself. 

Allison takes a deep breath. “After he died I simply…wasted away.” Her eyes go distant, “Didn’t sleep, barely ate, barely drank. By the time my employers had reported me missing I was barely alive, dehydrated and starving as I was.

“Victoria was a nurse at the hospital to which I was brought. She…saw something in me. I’m not sure what it was, even to this day, I’m not even sure _she_ knows. Maybe it was simply pity over my situation. Maybe she saw a daughter in me, even then.

“Either way, she tried to convince me to live. That I was worth more than I thought, that I was important, even if only to myself. She did convince me, in the end.” She looks up briefly at Stiles.

“But with the medicine at the time, the lack of resources, and the state I was in, there was nothing she could do to save me. She asked me if I wanted to live, if I was absolutely sure it was what I wanted.” Allison gnaws on her lower lip, “I was weak, barely conscious, practically delirious. And I saw him.” 

Her eyes look misty and Stiles wonders if vampires can cry. 

“My husband's name was Samuel.” She says, “And he was there, sitting next to Victoria, looking at me like he always had and smiling.” A tear tracks its way down her cheek, “He told me, in no uncertain terms, that I wasn’t allowed to die like this. That I was to take Victoria’s offer, no matter what it was, and get myself the life I deserved, even if it wasn’t with him.” 

Stiles feels a lump forming in his throat. 

“It wasn’t really him, it was a hallucination.” Allison says, her voice thick, “But at the time, it didn’t matter. The love of my life was telling me I had to live, no matter what. And I decided that I agreed with him.” 

She swipes a hand across her cheek and smiles at Stiles, “Victoria changed me then and there and ran with me.

“I won’t pretend that it wasn’t difficult, that becoming a vampire suddenly made the pain of losing him go away, but I had something I hadn’t before.” A smile splits her face, dimples gracing her face, “I had a family. Two people that loved me fiercely and with abandon. It was quite a lot to stumble into.” 

Stiles doesn’t know what to say, somewhat sure that if he even opens his mouth he’ll make a fool of himself. 

“So, now you know our stories.” She says and Stiles lets out a breath slowly. He sends another text to his dad to buy himself some time away from her golden eyes. 

“Thank you.” He breathes, “For trusting me with them.” Allison smiles her princess smile and Isaac grins. 

“You deserved to know.” Isaac says. 

“Still.” Stiles insists. 

“Thank you,” Allison says, “For bringing such life to our sister.” Stiles starts, whipping his gaze to her. 

“Before you,” She begins, “She struggled. It wasn’t always apparent, nor very overt, but it was clear how lonely she was.” 

“You’ve given her something that we never could.” Isaac says, smiling so genuinely at Stiles he inhales sharply, “You gave her hope, love.” 

“We are indebted to you, Stiles.” Allison insists and Stiles swallows. 

His eyes flick between them. 

“I’m not sure what to say to that.” He finally says and they chuckle. 

“That’s alright,” Allison says, “As long as you know the breadth of gratitude we feel.” 

Stiles nods for lack of anything else to do. 

The day drags. 

He spends it getting to know Allison and Isaac, asking question after question and answering just as many from Allison. Isaac doesn’t really ask, knowing what Stiles’ answer would be to any question he would ask. Stiles can’t even imagine the way that Isaac must live, seeing the past and the present at the same time, knowing people in an instant. 

It’s somewhat like what Lydia does, but yet so different, so complex. 

He feels at ease with them, receiving consistent updates from Isaac about Lydia and the rest of them and their positions. He still feels anxious, still feels near-constant worry about Lydia and his father, his friends. At least he knows that the tracker and his side-kick have been driven out of Washington and away from the humans Stiles cares about. 

At least he has that. 

He calls his dad a few times, updating him as much as he can. There isn’t much to say, truthfully, but it’s better than nothing, both for him and his dad. 

He continues to text Heather throughout the day, finding that talking to her keeps him balanced, more established in reality. Like not everything in the world is outrunning vampires and sitting in a hotel room with still more vampires and worrying about his girlfriend, who is also a vampire. His world was starting to feel unstable, and Heather helped to steady it. She drops off later in the day, probably for homework or some other extracurricular. He would be lying if he said he didn’t miss that normalcy. 

When the sun starts to go down, Isaac sits up abruptly, frowning with his eyes focused on the future. 

Allison flashes forward and grabs his hand. 

“What is it, what do you see?” She asks quietly, almost clinically. 

“Books.” Isaac says, his voice vague, his frown deepening in confusion, “Windows, shelves and shelves of books, a loft.” 

Allison hands him a pencil and a piece of paper but Stiles’ stomach has already dropped to his toes. 

He frozen, speechless as he watches Isaac sketch out familiar shapes; the wide window at the back of the room, the shelves on either side, the steps leading up to the upper level, even the tables in the middle. 

 _“Fuck.”_ He whispers. Isaac and Allison both look up at him. 

“Do you know this place?” Isaac asks and Stiles nods, numb with panic. 

Fuck fuck fuck _fuck fuck shit!_

“It’s the library of my old high school.” Stiles says, his voice tightening along with his throat. _Oh fuck, oh fuck, shit, no._

His phone rings in his hand and he looks at the screen to see Heather’s name on the screen. He almost melts into the floor in relief. _She’s okay._

“Heather.” Stiles answers, mostly on a gasp. 

He knows how big of a mistake he’s made when a laugh sounds over the line that decidedly doesn’t belong to Heather. 

“Not quite.” A male voice says, his voice dripping with sadistic glee and satisfaction. Stiles hears Allison whisper _God's teeth_ behind him

Stiles’ heart stops in his chest as his throat closes up. _It’s him._ He can’t help it when he stumbles to the floor, landing hard on his tailbone but it doesn’t even register as his fingers go numb around his phone. His vision tunnels, blacking at the edges. 

“Where is she?” Stiles whispers, his voice reedy and terrified. 

“Oh she’s fine, Stiles.” Donovan claims, “Nice school you got here, can’t imagine why you left.” 

Stiles’ breath starts coming in pants, his whole body shaking. 

“Where is she?” He demands, his voice still breathless and utterly non-threatening. 

“I just told you she’s fine, Stiles, aren’t you listening?” 

“Shut the fuck up!” Stiles shouts, surprising himself and Allison and Isaac who’ve taken a seat in front of him with twin looks of horror, no doubt hearing the other end of the phone call, “Where _the fuck_ is my best friend?!” 

Donovan laughs, “Oh, I love ‘em when they’re angry. So much more fun to _break.”_

Stiles shoots to his feet on unsteady legs but adrenaline is quickly kicking right the fuck in. 

 _“Is she alive?”_ Stiles demands, practically spitting the words out. 

“Yes, Stiles, you know it’s rude to ignore people when they’re talking to you.” 

“Forgive me for not trusting you.” Stiles bites out. “Prove it.”

Donovan sighs but there’s some distant noise on the other end before Stiles hears Heather’s voice. 

“Stiles?” She calls and Stiles almost collapses. 

“Heather, I’m right here, I’m here, just do whatever he says, I’ll be there soon.” He promises, not even knowing how he’s gonna go about doing that but not caring because it’s _her._

“Yes I think that’s best.” Donovan says, cutting Heather off. Stiles can hear her muffled struggling and he has to clench his hands into fists. He wants to punch a hole through something, preferably Donovan’s face. 

“Oh, and don’t think I don’t know your friends are listening in.” Donovan adds conversationally, “She won’t live another twelve hours if you don’t come alone, Stiles. I don’t think I need to tell you that there’s no way out of this for you.” 

 _That’s okay. That’s fine._ He thinks, _I just have to get Heather out._ He doesn’t think about anything else, his mind wholly focused on her and how he’s going to keep her safe. 

“What do you want?” Stiles asks, his brain moving a mile a minute yet focused entirely on this phone call. 

“Well I think that much is obvious.” Donovan chuckles. 

“I need specifics, _asshole.”_ Stiles enunciates. 

Donovan just laughs. 

“How about this, you come to your school within the next four hours--” Stiles tries to interrupt but Donovan speaks over him, “Alright, alright, perhaps that’s too soon. Let’s make it eight hours then, should give you plenty of time to get here.

“You come alone,” Donovan reminds him, “And you surrender yourself. Give yourself over and she lives, you understand how this works, don’t you?” 

Stiles swallows. “Yes.” He says through his teeth. 

“Brilliant.” Donovan says brightly, “We’ll be waiting for you in the library.” 

Stiles is about to hang up when Donovan speaks up again, “And don’t worry, Stiles. I’ll keep her _safe.”_ He almost whispers the word and absolute dread skates down Stiles’ spine. 

“Don’t _touch her.”_ Stiles hisses, ire practically dripping from every letter, surprising even himself with his violent reaction. 

“Oh you don’t need to worry, Stiles, I’m a perfect gentleman.” 

Stiles hears laughter and then the line disconnects with incongruously cheerful little beeps from his phone. 

For a moment, nothing happens, the three of them frozen in shock and horror. Allison and Isaac recover faster than him and become blurs around the hotel room, packing everything up and righting the suite. Isaac comes to a stop in front of Stiles as Allison leaves the room altogether, presumably to check them out. 

Isaac holds Stiles’ bag out and Stiles takes it with numb, trembling fingers. 

“We have to go, Stiles.” Isaac pleads, his face unbelievably sad. 

It shakes Stiles to his core. 

He nods dumbly, unable to form words or even thoughts. 

He follows Isaac out and, once Isaac is sure there’s no one in the hall, he lifts Stiles by his waist and bolts down the stairwell at a completely unnatural speed. Stiles doesn’t even have the brain power to argue, or the desire to. 

His brain is alight with panic, every piston firing, but it feels like trudging through mud. His brain can’t stop repeating the words, _I’ll keep her_ **_safe_ ** _,_ like some sick, twisted mantra. 

They make it out to the car with Allison quick on their heels, diving gracefully and just a little too fast to be human into the driver’s seat. Isaac gently shoves Stiles into the back seat and slides across the hood and into the passenger seat. ****

Isaac pulls his phone out and lifts it to his ear, apparently having sped through the process of actually dialing someone. For one insane moment Stiles thinks about how annoying it must be to wait for technology to catch up to you. He almost giggles and he only just barely manages to push it down. The sound would no doubt be hysterical, and even he's getting worried about his own mental faculties at this point. 

“He’s made his move,” Isaac says simply into the phone, “He has Stiles’ friend, they’re at Beacon Hills High School in the library.” 

Stiles can’t stop the hand that rakes roughly through his hair, yanking the strands, trying desperately to ground himself. 

“No, we can’t make a move, he’ll kill her. He insisted Stiles go in alone. None of us are fast enough to get in there and save her before he’ll kill her.” 

Stiles sinks his teeth into his bottom lip and tries to suppress his whimper. He can’t. 

_He’ll kill her, he’ll kill her, he’ll kill her._

_I’ll keep her_ **_safe._ **

“There’s too many possibilities, too many variables. I can’t see anything.” Isaac says and Stiles’ last hope of some sort of reassurance that they’d get Heather out of this fades away like a puff of smoke.

“Of course I’m not sending him in alone, Lydia, I love him too.” Isaac bites out and Stiles doesn’t even have the emotional energy to be surprised by the words. 

“We have eight hours.” Isaac finally says. 

Something tries to break through the fog in Stiles’ head. He can’t tell what it is yet, but he grasps at it, clawing for some kind of an idea, _anything._

Finally, after what feels like hours but can only be seconds, the pieces fall together. 

“Wait.” Stiles says and Isaac’s eyes flash back to him. “I have an idea.” 

Isaac nods for him to continue as he moves to put the phone on speaker and Stiles leans between the driver’s and passenger’s seat, one hand on each. 

“I have to go in alone, there’s no way around that,” Stiles starts, ready for Lydia to try to interrupt him, and as much as he wants to hear her voice, he talks over her, “How far does your sense of smell go, your hearing?” 

“It depends,” Lydia says miserably and her voice runs over his fried nerves, soothing him minutely, “For me it’s only a mile or so before I lose the ability to hear something, but for someone like him it could be three or more. Scent too, for someone with his gifts.” She spits the word with derision, like she can’t bear to refer to him with anything even remotely positive.

“Okay.” Stiles says, his brain working through the options, “Okay, here’s what we do, we put me in there, long enough for me to distract him. Just enough that he won’t be paying attention to his surroundings,” He rushes to assure Lydia, “As soon as I show up by myself and no one comes swooping in, he’ll assume I’m alone. But you can’t move in too fast, he’ll still have more time to kill her than you will to save her because of how far out you’ll have to be.”

“Stiles he will _kill you.”_ Lydia hisses, “You won’t have time to distract him.” 

Stiles shakes his head, “No, he won’t. You said yourself that this is his most challenging round yet. He’ll savour it, milk it for all it’s worth. It wouldn’t mean anything if he jumped right in to killing me. It wouldn’t be enough of a victory.” He feels sick even speaking the words, even suggesting what he knows will probably be unimaginable pain for who even knew how long. 

“Isaac, would you be able to see when it’s safe to go in?” Stiles asks. Isaac’s eyes widen. 

“I have no idea,” He says, “Everything’s too uncertain. I can’t see how he’ll react.” 

“But you’d be able to tell after a certain length of time if he would notice you if you moved in, right?” Stiles presses. 

Isaac shakes his head, “I don’t know, Stiles, it’s too much of a gamble. I can’t know for sure.” 

“The future is always uncertain.” Stiles says, “There’s no way to know for sure that this will work or that it won’t. But we don’t have any other options.” 

“He’s right.” Allison murmurs to Stiles’ left. He wishes he could feel vindicated, or anything resembling a positive emotion right now. 

“No, absolutely not.” Lydia shouts over the phone. 

Stiles physically feels it when something in him _snaps._

“YES!” He shouts, “My _best friend_ is in danger, she could _die_ in less than eight hours, I’m not really in the mood to fucking argue about it!” 

The car is silent, including Lydia. 

Stiles grips the seats beneath his hand. 

“I would die for her, Lydia.” Stiles mutters, not even realising how true the statement had been until actually doing so was a real possibility. But now he knows, without a doubt, that he would die for Heather Sinclaire. 

“Please don’t make me put you in a position where you will.” Lydia pleads softly. And Stiles hates it, knowing that he’s asking Lydia to do the impossible. If the roles were reversed, if Stiles was sending Lydia into danger so she could save anyone of her family members, he’s not sure he’d survive it.

But he’d know he wouldn’t be able to stop her either. 

“I don’t have a choice, Lydia.” He tells her honestly, “If you have any other ideas, I’m all ears, but as it stands, this is what we’re doing.” 

Isaac inhales sharply and Stiles glances over at him. 

“Something’s changed.” Isaac murmurs, almost to himself. 

“What changed?” Allison asks. 

Isaac shakes his head, “I can’t tell, but whatever it was narrowed down the possibilities. It’s not much, but it’s something.” He shrugs. 

“Stiles?” Lydia says from the phone, and something about her voice, how weak and tight it sounds, makes Isaac take it off speakerphone and hand it to Stiles. 

Stiles takes it, settles back into the back seat for some semblance of privacy, and places it up to his ear, “I’m here.” 

She sniffles and Stiles’ chest clenches. 

“I love you.” She says, her voice breaking. Stiles squeezes his eyes shut, pulling his bottom lip between his teeth and biting down hard enough he’s sure it’ll bruise. _So this is what changed._

“I love you.” He tells her, his voice steadier than he’d thought it would be, but nowhere near composed. 

“I--I just…” Lydia breaks off with a half-sob, “You--you were it for me.” She confesses and Stiles hates how bittersweet the knowledge is. 

“And you for me.” He croaks. 

He wants to tell her this isn’t goodbye. He wants to tell her that he’ll be okay, that everything will be fine, but he can’t. He doesn’t know how this will pan out, and he refuses to make empty promises to the woman he loves. 

Stiles wants, so _desperately,_ to be wrong about how he thinks this will pan out. But he’s fairly certain he’s not. 

“I don’t even know what to say.” She admits and Stiles clenches his free hand into a fist. 

“If you were human,” He starts, “I’d have fantasized about an old porch swing with lemonade and grandkids.” She makes a noise, and it sounds like pain in one simple exhalation. 

“And I’d have wanted a wedding in the sun with everyone we love there, and a house with an extra bedroom.” He continues, “I’d have wanted to lay with you on a picnic blanket and watch the sun light up your hair.” 

“Stiles.” She whispers. 

“But you’re not human,” He says, “And I never wanted any of that with you.” He takes a deep breath. 

“What I want with you doesn’t mean marriage or picnic blankets or porch swings, what I want with you is so much _bigger_ than all of that.” Stiles croaks, his voice finally giving out on him, trying to squeeze past the ever growing lump in his throat. “I love you so fucking much Lydia. I love you more than anyone has ever loved anyone and you have no idea how much I wanted with you.” 

“I’d have married you.” Lydia sobs, “I’d have worn a white dress and walked down the aisle to you and I would have made you lemonade.” 

“I know.” Stiles says, “I know, Lydia.” 

“I love you so much, Stiles.” She says and Stiles takes a deep breath. 

“It’s Mieczysław, actually.” He says. 

“What?” 

“That’s my given name.” He explains, “I don’t use it because no one knows how to pronounce it, and it’s a mouthful anyways. Stiles is just easier.” 

“‘Glorious sword’,” She says and Stiles cracks the barest approximation of a smile. Of course she’d know what it translates to, “I like it. Mieczysław?”

She pronounces it with too much ‘e’ and he corrects her. She tries again and gets it right, shockingly enough. 

“Yeah.” 

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“It never came up, I wasn’t trying to keep it from you, I just never thought about it.” Stiles tells her, feeling caught in a limbo between feeling better and feeling worse as time moves forward, heedless of his wants and needs. 

“Thank you, for telling me.” She says, her voice tightening. 

He doesn’t know what he wants to do. On the one hand, he wants to keep talking to her until the last second, wants to keep her voice fresh in his mind when he faces Donovan. But, on the other, he doesn’t want to make her have to talk to the person she loves until he goes to die. 

Because he can’t guarantee that he won’t die today. 

But most of all, he doesn’t want to say goodbye. 

“Do you want me to stay?” Stiles asks, deciding that he can’t make that choice for her. 

“Of course I do.” She says, “But I have to drive. I drive the fastest and we don’t have much time. I have to be focused on that, I’m so sorry.” 

While the news hurts--physically aching somewhere Stiles can’t even reach--he’s relieved. 

“It’s okay.” He promises, “It’s okay. Just…save Heather. Please.” 

Lydia sniffles. “I will.  I’ll save her Stiles.” 

“I love you.” He says.

“I love you.” 

And then he hangs up before either of them can say anything else. 

He hands Isaac back his phone and swipes a sleeve across his face, drying the tears there. 

He fishes his own phone out and calls his dad. 

“Stiles? What’s wrong?” 

Stiles bites down on his lip. 

“Plans have changed.” He says, his voice sounding far off and vague to his ears, “The tracker, the guy who’s after me, he has Heather.” 

“Jesus.” His dad whispers and Stiles digs his fingernails into his palm. 

“We’re going to get her.” Stiles says, “We’re gonna get her out of there.” 

“Stiles, what aren’t you telling me?” 

Stiles inhales deeply. “I have to go in first, to give them time to get her out.” 

“Fuck.” His dad breathes, then, “No! No, Stiles, absolutely not, are you _insane?_ This is a hostage situation you need cops--”

“And they’ll die too.” Stiles says simply, “He’s too fast. He’ll kill anyone near me and then we’ll be back where we started but then Heather will be dead.” It feels like ripping skin away from a still healing wound. 

“Stiles you can’t just--just risk your life to--to--”

“To what? Save my best friend’s life?” Stiles snaps. “This isn’t up for debate, this is our only option, this is what I have to do.” 

“So what is this?” His dad yells, “Is this the goodbye? Is that why you called me? You’re going to make me say goodbye to my _only son,_ over the goddamn _phone?”_

“Would you have rathered I didn’t tell you?” Stiles retorts, “Would have rathered I lied and continued to send you texts saying I was fine when I wasn’t? What the hell did you _want_ me to do?” 

“I want you to not die!” His dad roars, “Stiles, you’re--” He falters, “You’re all I’ve got kid.” 

All the anger, the fight, bleeds out of Stiles, leaving him so exhausted he thinks he’ll crumble underneath it. 

“I know.” Stiles croaks, “Fuck, I know. I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry.” The tears fall freely now and he feels expressly and unforgivably like he’s crossed into a territory he won’t ever come back from. 

“I’m so sorry.” He sobs. 

“Stiles, what can I do to get you out of this, both of you, _please_ tell me something I can do.” His dad begs and Stiles shakes his head. 

“There’s--there’s nothing I can’t--” 

Isaac reaches back and snatches the phone from Stiles and puts it up to his own ear. 

“Sheriff Stilinski? This is Isaac Argent, I’m Lydia’s brother.” He greets and Stiles can’t hear the other end of the call. 

“There’s actually something I need from you…no, no I wouldn’t do that to you sir, I respect you too much…I need you to get into contact with Beacon Hills law enforcement…Stiles can only see so far ahead, I, however, am not burdened by the same near-sightedness…our strategy is to distract the tracker, to lead him to believe he’s won until we can move in to take Heather and Stiles out…obviously. I’m not letting him go in there without a way to get him out…”

Stiles wants to smack Isaac so hard he bites through his tongue.

“Yes sir, I do…tell them there’s a hostage situation happening at the high school. The perpetrator is armed and considered extremely, extremely dangerous. Say whatever you have to to get them to proceed with caution, I won’t have innocent people die because they underestimated the problem…good. Call them when I give you the word, how long should it take them to mobilize?…alright I’ll contact you at that point and you can send them in…I can’t be certain of anything, Sheriff, but I can promise you that I, and the rest of my family, will do anything to get your son to safety…I know he is. And I promised you and him that I’d keep him safe, and I will do that.” 

Isaac is silent for a while, listening to Stiles’ dad speak on the other end. He throws in an affirmative or two and at least three times as many negatives, but by the time he’s done and handed the phone back to Stiles, Stiles’ dad sounds far less upset. 

“You will do everything that man says, alright Stiles?” His dad orders and Stiles nods. 

“Yes sir.” He says and his dad sighs. 

“We’re gonna get you safe, kid. I promise.” 

“I know.” Stiles lies. 

“Alright. I’ll talk to you when this is all over.” His dad insists and Stiles has to bite back the scream of frustration. 

“Yeah.” He croaks, “You too.” 

“I love you.” His dad says, his tone solemn. 

“I love you too, dad.” Stiles replies. 

The line goes dead. 

\---

In all honesty, Stiles had never given much thought to how he would die. But dying, in the place of someone he loves? It seems like a better way to go than most. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> basically when donovan calls stiles he has a panic attack when donovan says he has heather, and then there's little tidbits of anxiety throughout in various places, particularly when driving to BH
> 
> i may end up taking two weeks to write the last chapter since there's so much i want to cover, but i'm aiming for one, so we'll find out together


	17. Whispering Like It's a Secret; Uttered to Condemn the One Who Hears It

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so there’s pretty heavy description of violence in this one though i wouldn’t call it graphic. it’s just sorta,,,intense. it’s pretty on par with both of the books and its pretty canon-typical too so i’m pretty much only warning you cuz i know violence really bothers some people. if you have to skip it, do, but i won’t be leaving a note at the end. donovan also says some really creepy shit to heather/about heather which i feel the need to warn you about. i promise there is no threat of sexual assault to her, past or otherwise, donovan just makes it sound like there is, and he doesn't ever say anything explicit, it's all suggestion. i think that’s all i have to warn you about. so, y’know, enjoy?

The streets of Beacon Hills are just as he remembers them, even at two in the morning. 

This early, no one walks the streets, there are no cars on the roads, and the only lights are the yellow-orange street lamps reflected in the wet asphalt. 

Stiles is driving the last couple of miles to the school by himself. He’d dropped Isaac and Allison off a safe distance from the tracker’s senses. 

He hadn’t said goodbye, hadn’t uttered a word. They hadn’t either, none of them willing to say goodbye, even if it  _ was _ going to be the last time they saw each other. It wouldn’t have made it any easier, and Stiles wasn’t willing to make it harder. 

Stiles’ hands had been shaking, his legs almost numb with panic as he had been driving, but now, as he pulls into the parking lot of the school he’d spent years attending, he can’t feel anything. 

He’s completely numb. 

He stops the car, not looking at where he’d parked it, leaving it on with the keys in the ignition, oblivious to everything aside from the wet ground beneath his feet, trudging forward on shaking legs. 

It’s an absent sort of observation that he’s terrified. He can feel his heart pounding in his chest, hear the blood rushing in his ears, can feel the unsteadiness of his steps, but it doesn’t register. Like it’s happening to someone else. 

A distant, quiet part of his mind tells him he’s going to snap from all the stress, that too much panic will crack his already fragile psyche. 

But, right now, as he walks into the school, hearing the familiar squeaking of his shoes on the linoleum floors, he thinks that maybe losing his mind would be a mercy. 

The route to the library is familiar, even in the darkened halls that look so much more foreboding than they do during the day. Or that could be the fact that he’s walking to his inevitable torture, to his possible death. His  _ probable  _ death, he supposes numbly. 

Stiles pushes the door of the library open, meeting the familiar resistance of the heavy wooden door. He doesn’t pause, doesn’t prepare himself, doesn’t even blink as he steps into what will probably be the last place he’ll ever see. There’s no way to prepare for what he’s walking into. 

He looks up and sees her sitting in one of the chairs at a study desk, her blonde hair tied up in a ponytail that’s loose and messy, almost like she’d fallen asleep with it in. One side of her jaw is blue, and there’s dried blood by her temple and at one corner of her mouth. 

She looks up the second the door opens and she lets out a sob. 

“Stiles?” Heather whispers and every ounce of calm Stiles had collected, the peace he’d made with the situation, evaporates. 

He runs to her, adrenaline spurring him forward despite the weakening of his limbs. 

“Ah, ah, ah.” A voice chastises, and then Stiles’ feet leave the ground altogether. He doesn’t even feel the impact against the bookshelf at first; he hears it. And then the pain creeps in, starting at a crawl and then racing up from his back and through his right arm. From his elbow down all he can feel is pain, throbbing in time with his heartbeat, and his breath leaves him in a wheeze as he collapses to the ground on his stomach, coughing weakly.

“So, you’re here alone.” Donovan remarks breezily, coming to stand above Stiles, “I’m surprised you listened to me, what with all the people that are fairly insistent about your survival.” He crouches down and wrenches Stiles’ head up by a fistful of his hair and pain shoots down the back of Stiles’ head, “I’m almost curious about what you said to convince them.” He breathes into Stiles’ ear.

“Stiles!” Heather shouts and Donovan lets go of Stiles head, letting it smack against the ground. Stiles groans and rolls over to see Donvan walking back across the library at a completely human pace to Heather. 

“I thought we had a deal, sweets,” He murmurs to her, tucking a stray piece of blood-caked hair behind her ear and stroking his thumb across the bruise on her jaw, “You stay quiet while I deal with him, and I don’t have to hurt you.” He hums as he caresses the bloody corner of her mouth. “Well, I don’t have to hurt you  _ more.” _

“You stay away from him, you sick fuck.” Heather spits, ripping her face away from Donovan’s hand. He laughs. 

“Don’t--” Stiles gasps, finally getting some air back in his lungs, “Don’t touch her.” His voice is strained and even to himself, he doesn’t sound very convincing. 

Donovan laughs again, and places a gentle kiss on Heather’s forehead, who flinches violently back and growls at him. 

“Back the fuck off!” She snaps. 

“You’re in no position to make threats, Stiles, and we both know it.” Donovan says, ignoring Heather, and Stiles slowly makes it to his feet. 

“You said if I came, you’d leave her alone.” Stiles manages through gritted teeth, still feeling the pain vibrating through his back. 

“But that’s not at  _ all _ I said, Stiles.” Donovan says, turning back to Stiles with a playful grin, “I told you it’s rude not to listen when people talk to you.”

Dread pools at the base of his spine, heavy like lead.

_ What does he mean?  _

“If you remember correctly,” Donovan continues, his tone jovially instructional, like a professor teaching his favourite part of the curriculum, “I told you that if you came alone--surrendered yourself--then she would live. I never specified that I wouldn’t hurt her.” 

Heather whimpers, but manages to turn it into a growl as Donovan turns back to her.

Stiles sees red. 

“You fucking  _ bastard.”  _ He spits and Donovan turns, a slow grin stretching his mouth. “Get away from her!”

Donovan laughs derisively, “We talked about this. You’re in no position for orders.” 

Stiles doesn’t think about it.

He just moves, running towards Donovan and Heather, meaning to get her away from him anyway he can. 

Donovan laughs again and ducks, using Stiles’ momentum against him and sending him rolling over Donovan’s back. Stiles coughs as his already battered back hits the ground. 

He looks up at Donovan in time to see a feral, satisfied grin spreading across his face, widening until his mouth is just a slash of teeth, white and glistening, fangs dropping as Stiles watches with distant fascination. 

Stiles doesn’t even see Donovan move but he hears a crack that precedes the absolutely  _ blinding  _ agony that races through his leg. He gasps with the force of it, not even having the presence of mind to scream for a few seconds. 

Then scream he does, and it rips from his threat painfully as he curls around his leg, balling his hands into fists, his fingernails biting into the skin of his palms. The taste of metal coats the back of his throat and he gags.

He hears more screaming, distant through the ringing in his ears. It’s not him. 

Stiles wrenches his eyelids open in time to see Donovan gripping Heather by her hair and pulling her to her feet. Donovan stares at Stiles, making sure he has Stiles’ attention before he slowly dips his head to Heather’s neck. He grins, then sinks his teeth into the skin just below her ear. 

“No!” Stiles shouts hoarsely. The pain of his leg is almost dulled by the terror he feels at seeing Heather’s face screw up in agony, hearing her screams echoing through the library. 

Donovan wrenches his teeth from her neck and tosses her to the floor by her hair. He licks his blood-stained lips hungrily and grins down at Stiles. 

“You know, Stiles,” He starts conversationally, “You’re actually quite disappointing prey. It was so easy to find your weaknesses, so easy to figure out where you’d go, what you would do if I gave you no other options. Humans are so tediously predictable, sometimes. Your pressure points are always the people you  _ love.”  _ He spits the word with so much venom Stiles shrinks away from it. 

“That little rouse with you father was good, I’ll give you that much. You almost had me. I couldn’t figure out where you’d actually gone, surely you wouldn’t go where you said you were going.” He crouches down to be eye level with Stiles, hunched around his injured leg. He’s only a few inches away, his breath ghosting across Stiles’ face. Stiles is panting from the pain, his teeth grinding together in an effort not to scream again. 

“Until I realised I don’t have to.” Donovan says, smiling, “You gave me a name, Stiles, told me  _ exactly  _ where to look.” 

Stiles gasps, connecting the dots with a miserable sort of clarity. 

“I had Tracey take a look at your school records, and once we knew your previous school, she made her way down here. Did you know Beacon Hills High School only has one ‘Heather’ currently enrolled?” Donovan smiles, leaning forward and placing a hand on Stiles’ shoulder. Stiles braces for something, not even sure what it is he’s bracing for, but nothing happens. He blinks up at Donovan, who grins before ripping Stiles’ arm out of the socket.

Stiles cries out and feels involuntary tears streaming down his face. His breaths come in short inhales and he dully registers that he has to get a handle on it before he hyperventilates. The term  _ shock _ runs through his head but he can’t remember what to do to stop it. He can’t even fucking  _ think. _

“And, lucky for me,” Donovan continues as though he hadn’t just dislocated Stiles’ shoulder, “She’s an emancipated adult.” He lifts Heather with a bizarre sort of tenderness, holding her bridal style and depositing her on the table next to them, “There’ll be no one around to miss her.” He murmurs it as he runs the backs of his fingers over her cheek. She weakly flinches away from him, moaning as the motion pulls on the wound on her neck.

“Well, there would’ve been you,” He allows, “But you won’t live any longer than she does.”

“You--” Stiles gasps, “You promised.” It’s a weak sentiment, not even an argument, and Donovan knows it too. 

“Yes I did.” Donovan turns back to Stiles, “I promised she would live. Like I said, I’m a gentleman, and I’m a man of my word. But the term ‘alive’ has so much wiggle room in our world. I never guaranteed how long she’d live, or what as.” 

Stiles realises with a painful jolt what Donovan is getting at. 

“You’re--you’re turning her.” Stiles pants and Donovan smirks. 

“Theo left my coven, I'm down a member.” He explains and Stiles feels sick.  _ How did we not see through that? _

“So she’ll live, like I promised she would, and she’ll stay with me.” The possessive edge to his voice sends bile up Stiles’ throat. Donovan leans against the table, nonchalance scripted in every angle of the pose, so completely at odds with the situation.

“You might be wondering why I’m telling you all of this, and it’s not to brag.” Donovan adds, waving a hand, “I’m not really one for bragging. But it is a neat sort of torture, don’t you think?” He looks down at Stiles, who must look as pathetic as he feels because Donovan grins, “I leave you with the knowledge that you are the one and only reason that your best friend is a vampire, and trapped for eternity with your killer.” 

Heather whimpers and tries to scoot away, but she can’t get very far. Donovan reaches out and holds her hand, making the gesture look somehow kind and she lets out a weak sob, all of the fight Stiles loves about her leaving her in an instance. 

Stiles reaches out and grabs Donovan’s leg and--with as much force as he can muster--yanks it out from under him. 

Donovan doesn’t fall, he barely even stumbles, but he does exactly what Stiles had been going for and hauls Stiles to his feet. 

“That’s cute, you know,” Donovan bites out, his eyes giving away the first real dose of fury Stiles has seen so far, “So  _ noble  _ of you, to defend her like that.” He throws Stiles across the room and Stiles smacks into another bookshelf, breaking a few of the shelves and sending books tumbling to the floor.

He lays there on the floor, breathing shallowly, as Donovan advances.

“But you know it doesn’t matter.” Donovan purrs, pulling Stiles into a sitting position, “As soon as I’m done with you, she’s mine.”

He yanks Stiles’ tee shirt to the side, leaning menacingly over him. 

“And, you know, I should thank you,” Donovan whispers, “Without you, I wouldn’t have even known about her. I get two for the price of one.” He chuckles softly, then grins, the slash of teeth the last thing Stiles sees before Donovan’s teeth tear through his skin. 

This is it. 

He’d known, of course, that there was no way he’d make it through this alive. As Donovan’s teeth dig through skin and muscle with a deep, throbbing ache, Stiles knows he made all the wrong choices. 

Not that there had been any choices at all, this is always what he was going to do. Even if he could do it over again, this is the only outcome, this is the only ending for him. 

He supposes it’s alright, to have died trying to keep someone he loves safe. It hadn’t worked, and that’s really the crux, isn’t it? Here he is, being drained of life, and he hadn’t even done what he’d been trying to do. 

He can hear screaming, probably his, but the world is starting to fuzz out. He’s slipping, closer and closer to a darkness that seems so inviting and terrifying at the same time. He  _ wants  _ to slip into it, to succumb to the murky water, let it carry him away. 

But then he realises the screaming isn’t his. 

With great effort, so much that it’s agonizing, he wrenches his leaden eyes open to see the hazy image of Heather on the table.  _ Why is she on a table?  _ He can’t push through the confusion pulling at him, making everything so inconsequential. 

She’s screaming, he can tell, but why is she screaming? He wants to tell her it’s okay, that he’s just going to sleep, because he is. 

He’s just going to sleep, that’s all. 

He’ll be back soon. 

Why can’t he tell her that? What’s wrong with his voice? 

Sharp, blinding pain burns up his neck and he realises that there was someone in front of him. The guy smiles, looking up from bending over, his teeth covered in red and his mouth rimmed with it. 

_ Why? _

He drops Stiles, leaving him to fall gracelessly to the floor, dazed. He’s a blur for so little time Stiles thinks he imagined it. Then he’s at the table with Heather. Stiles doesn’t like that, it scares him, but  _ why?  _

Stiles tries to drag some semblance of awareness from his foggy brain, tries to piece together what’s going on while the guy--Donovan, it’s Donovan, why is that bad?--puts his hands on either side of Heather’s face. 

Sheer, unadulterated,  _ panic  _ tears through him and he  _ finally _ gets is and shouts,  _ “NO!”  _ as Donovan snaps her head violently to one side, a sickening crack reverberating through the library. 

Stiles is frozen, staring through tunneled vision as Heather’s body gets dropped, her head at the complete wrong angle and her hair fanned out around her on the floor. 

He gasps for air but he  _ can’t fucking  _ **_breathe,_ ** his lungs fighting him with every breath. He knows--distantly--that that’s very, very bad but God, he doesn’t  _ care.  _

Donovan saunters back to Stiles and says, “Now, where were we?” but Stiles can hardly hear it, like Donovan’s speaking through water. The world fuzzes out again in dim confusion, everything losing meaning as Stiles loses all of the awareness he’d managed to find.

Stiles doesn’t know how to answer the question but it doesn’t matter because Donovan is leaning over him again and his head disappears while Stiles wonders what the right answer could’ve been. A dull ache starts in his shoulder and he reaches up to massage it but nothing happens. His hand stays at his side, useless. He feels like something happened to it but he can’t remember what. 

And then everything fades, leaking away by degrees. The pain goes, seeming to melt away, and Stiles relaxes. It’s replaced by numbness, but that’s okay. That’s better. 

He can’t hear anything next, like the world floats out of his awareness, the already muffled quality of everything finally rounding out to nothing at all.  _ It’s okay, it’s fine.  _

His vision is blacking out, and something in him says  _ this is it, this is all we get.  _ He knows, though he doesn’t remember how he knows, that once his vision’s gone that’s all there is. After that he’s gone. 

But then everything changes, things get more confusing instead of less. He doesn’t go. 

Blurred figures move in front of him, impossibly fast, and another one is moved away from him.

It almost looks like he falls apart, but other figures are standing near it, holding the pieces. 

Light flares in front of him and he can’t blink it away. Yellowy-orange and flickering and moving. It gets bigger and smaller. He doesn’t understand. 

He sees a flash of red, and he knows, he  _ knows,  _ that that means something to him. But he can’t remember what. 

He wonders, absently, what could’ve happened if he weren’t dying. 

Because he knows he’s dying. There’s no other explanation. 

If he weren’t dying he’d want Lydia. 

_ Lydia.  _

The flash of red, that was Lydia, that was her hair. 

The last vestiges of his brain cobble together to form one final thought, the last thing he’ll ever think. 

_ I should’ve protected her.  _

And then there’s nothing at all. 


	18. With a Heavy Heart

He supposes death is easy.  _ This _ is easy, at least. Perhaps this is death. 

Could it be death? Does it matter if it is? Or if it isn’t?

It’s simple, whatever it is. It’s peaceful. 

How had he ever been afraid of this?

Afraid for himself, for his mother, for his father. How could he be afraid of something so easy? 

Perhaps it’s not a fear of death, but rather a fear of the lack of life. 

That makes sense. 

Does this make sense? Does it matter? It feels like it should matter, like it means something to him. 

Is he dying? Is that what this is?

There’s voices. He can't tell where from, but he can hear them. Like they travel to him through water. 

He should open his eyes. Can he?

What will happen if he does?

Will he find out he’s really dead? That he really won't live any longer? Does the thought make him sad or happy? 

He really can’t tell. But he feels no fear. And that’s a relief. 

He thinks he might have felt a lot of fear before now, whatever  _ now _ is. 

It’s nice to not be afraid. 

He still can’t decide if he should open his eyes. Perhaps he doesn’t want to know the outcome of all of this. Maybe it’s better not to know. 

_ If you never ask, the answer will always be no.  _

What was that? It’s familiar, something he'd read or heard. Something someone said to him, over and over again. A motto. 

But whose? 

The voices persist. They get louder, clearer. 

His heart…

Is that his heart?

Surely it isn’t.

_ I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. I heard many things in hell. How, then, am I mad? _

He can hear his heart. 

This isn’t death. 

Something…something outside of death. Between life and death. Like a sky’s twilight, between night and day.

Where, then, is he?

It matters now. 

Everything matters. 

He remembers. He can hear the last of his life.  _ NO! _

_ This is it, this is all we get.  _

A blonde halo. 

And there was red, so much red. It was dark and it was harsh and it was beautiful. 

How can it be all of those things?

And he’s happy, he’s so, so happy. Why is he happy? Was death not something he wanted? Had he wanted life instead?

What was there to life? Isn’t life harder than this? Isn’t this easy? Peaceful? 

Why would he not want this?

It’s his heart. It beats and beats, and his lungs pull air in and dispel it, and he can hear voices. 

_ …different for everyone…  _

_ …no wrong way… _

_ …he’ll be alright… _

_ …listen to his heart… _

His heart. 

It hurts. 

_ He  _ hurts. Why does he hurt?

He’s floating, between this life and the next, but maybe not even that. Maybe he’s just floating in the space of his own head. 

_ Lydia, he’s going to be fine, I saw it.  _ He recognizes that voice. That voice is familiar, soothing. That voice loves him. 

Lydia… 

It  _ hurts,  _ why does it hurt so much?

He can feel his hand, can feel a hand holding it. Smooth fingers against his skin; tense, careful. 

Always so careful. 

He can see a meadow, idyllic and shining in the sunlight. No, not the sunlight. Glittering prisms of light, sending shards of sunshine out in every direction. 

Pink and lavender and green and…red. 

Red. 

But it’s not harsh, not dark. 

It’s radiant. Like liquid fire, beautiful and impossible and brilliant. 

His heart… 

God, it  _ hurts, why does everything  _ **_hurt_ ** _? _

His shoulder aches, his back throbs with a dull sort of pain, his leg screams almost as loud as his arm, and yet none of it compares. 

What hurts?

It  _ burns. _

It’s in his muscles, his veins, his bones, his very marrow. 

Every human inch of him, consumed. 

His lungs breathe in, they breathe out. His heart beats. 

_ For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are one.  _

His heart beats. 

_ Can you hear it?  _

He can hear a piano. 

_ I hear it.  _ The voice is thick, gasping, muffled as if hidden behind hands. 

What is he supposed to be hearing? 

Singular notes. One right after the other. The music has a pulse. 

It swells, and swells, and swells around him. 

It’s loud and beautiful and somehow he knows it’s for him. 

It’s soft, sad, happy. It’s hope and sorrow and  _ longing.  _

But maybe there is no music.

Maybe silence fills the theatre and there is nothing at all but the swaying of curtains and the heavy feeling of silence. 

_ Stiles? Can you hear me? _

_ Yes,  _ he thinks,  _ yes, of course I can hear you. I love you, I love you so much.  _

There is one final note, a few final words, the closing of curtains and the opening of the theatre doors. There is an end and a beginning. 

_ Death is the dropping of the flower that the fruit may swell.  _

But it’s not death at all. It never was. 

It’s life. 

He opens his eyes. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> quotes:   
> first: unknown  
> second: "Tell Tale Heart", Edgar Allen Poe  
> third: Kahlil Gibran  
> fourth: Henry Ward Beecher


	19. I Surrender Who I've Been

The first thing he knows is how bright it is. Everything is so bright. He blinks. Blinks again. 

The ceiling. Yes, that’s it. Has to be the ceiling. But it’s weird, different. He can see every detail, every pock and texture, places where the paint is thinner, where the popcorn effect wasn’t applied well. 

There’s movement next to him and he sits upright, rolling away, off the couch he’d been laying on and suddenly ten feet away. He’s tense, suddenly and instinctively crouched in a defensive posture. 

It all happened so fast he should be dizzy, should be completely reeling but he’s not. He had seen everything while in motion, hadn’t once lost track of himself or his surroundings. 

By the time he’s across the room he’s already processed everything and understands what he’d seen and that he doesn’t need to be crouched. 

He stands upright, instantly. The second he thinks to do it it’s already done. 

He knows this room, it’s familiar to him. 

The art on the walls, their movement, the story they’re telling. The piano, the bed, the bookshelves. 

Lydia’s room. 

His eyes snap to the couch, back to where he’d been laying. She’s sitting on the coffee table next to it, her head bowed. 

Like she’s refusing to look at him. 

“Lyd--” It’s his voice, simply because he’d felt his throat move, felt his tongue on the backs of his teeth, but it doesn’t sound like him. 

It’s musical, somehow. Deep, but complex, layers and layer of sound. How can a voice be complex? 

“Lydia?” He tries again. It’s his voice, but it’s not his human voice. 

He’s not human. 

That’s the only explanation. 

He catalogues, like he always does, like he knows how. He can hear footsteps downstairs, each of them so distinct and belonging to different people and he can parse them all out--but one set is unfamiliar. He can hear the forrest outside the window, can hear the highway beyond that. The rushing of cars and the raindrops falling on the mossy ground. 

It’s all familiar and yet so out of place. He shouldn’t be able to hear these things, not from where he is. They don’t fit in the bedroom of the woman he loves. It’s disorienting. 

“Lydia.” He says again, just to feel her name, to taste it like he couldn’t have before. Everything is to different that even her name feels new. 

She looks up and he’s stunned. 

He’d been wrong. 

For months he’d thought that Lydia was the most beautiful  _ thing  _ he’d ever seen, that there was nothing that could compare to her and the ethereality she possesses.

And he had been  _ wrong. _

His human eyes hadn’t done her any justice. He’d thought he knew the shape of her face, that he knew the bow of her lips and the roundness of her eyes, the curve of her cheekbone and the slight upturn of her nose. He’d thought he knew the green of her eyes. 

But now he knows he had been wrong--he had been wrong and he had been  _ blind.  _

Now he finally sees her. 

Her lips are soft, and full; rosy pink and slightly dented from being bitten and he can see every minute divot in the skin. Her cheeks are pink, but it’s faint--it must have been a few days since she’d had anything to eat, he thinks absently--and he can see the smooth texture of her face, every detail of it suddenly clear and pristine. Her hair is pulled to one side and tied into a messy bun, but he can see each individual strand; can see the oranges that mix with the red, and the browns and blondes and pinks. 

He can’t even quantify what he sees, can’t come up with the right words, the right turn of phrase to express anything in front of him. But she’s  _ beautiful,  _ and magnificent and stunning and wonderful and arresting. 

And none of those words could ever do her justice.

She’d changed since he last saw her, now wearing a sky blue dress that falls off her shoulders, which would be distracting, but the slope of them is rounded. Like she’s braced for something, something dangerous.

He spins the second he means to, looking behind him to locate the threat and protect her from it. 

But there’s nothing there, nothing to see behind him but the window and the forest beyond that he can see in such crisp, clear detail but it’s unimportant right now. He turns back to Lydia. 

“What’s wrong?” He asks. His new voice is still startling, but he’s at least a little more capable of ignoring it now than he was when he first woke up, which couldn’t have been more than one full second ago.

“You’re--” She pauses and it must be because Stiles gasps. 

Her voice, something he had loved listening to--the sound of it a melody he’d wanted to know by heart--now,  _ now, _ he can hear it for what it is and it’s  _ captivating.  _ How is he meant to do anything at all but listen to her speak? 

“I’m sorry.” He says breathlessly, “You’re just…so beautiful.” 

A look of pain flashes across her face and he frowns. 

“What’s wrong?” He repeats, more insistent now, fear creeping into the edges of his awareness. 

“I--you’re--” She struggles, “Do you know what’s going on?” She finally manages to ask. 

Stiles nods. He only has time to think that he wants to be near her, wants to touch her and then he’s in front of her, sitting on the couch with his knees almost brushing hers and his hand reaching out. But he stops himself, recognizing that she might not want to be touched right now, though he doesn’t know why. 

“I’m a vampire.” He tells her, and it’s an explanation and an admission and an impossibility, but it’s also the truth. 

“Yes.” She confirms though he hadn’t needed her to, “Do you know how that happened? Do you remember?” 

Lydia’s eyes study him intently and he frowns again. 

“I--kind of,” He starts, finding that it’s much easier now to redirect a train of thought, easier to switch what he had been saying, “I remember the library…and Heather--” His eyes widen.

“Oh my god, is she okay?” Stiles asks, his voice going high with immediate panic, and the intensity of it is staggering. He remembers now, the snap of her neck and the halo of blonde hair around her head as she’d laid there, dead. 

“Yes, yes she’s--she’s alright.” Lydia says and Stiles is shocked. No, there’s no way she could be alright, she’d  _ died.  _

“But I saw her  _ die.”  _ He insists, “I was there when he…” He trails off, fury burning through his veins and contorting his face in a snarl that he knows he wouldn’t recognize if he could see it. 

“We took care of him.” Lydia says simply and there’s a glint of something in her eyes, something like satisfaction. He feels similarly. 

“Good.” He nods, and again it’s simple to redirect his brain, to jump back onto their previous topic, “Where is she?” 

“Downstairs.” Lydia explains, “With Jackson.” 

Stiles laughs, the sound so unlike his human laugh and yet he can still hear the threads of its origin here and there, “Oh, I bet she loves that.” 

Lydia grimaces. 

“What aren’t you telling me?” Stiles demands, his voice coming out sharper than he means. 

“Heather’s…angry. She only woke up a little earlier than you did, a few hours ago. She’s confused and refuses to speak to any of us. It’s all we can do to keep her in the house.” Lydia explains and Stiles nods, “She’s waiting to speak to you.” 

“Why is she angry?” He asks, trying to remember his last moments, what could’ve happened to make… 

“She got turned.” He realises aloud and Lydia nods solemnly. Stiles sighs. “Well, shit.” He says and she huffs a tiny laugh. 

“Succinct.” She determines. 

“Alright, guess I should go talk to her.” He only spares a thought to leave the room and automatically his body is already at the door. 

“Wait.” She stops him, an arm on his bicep and the touch sends shivers across his skin. He inhales sharply and immediately goes still. “Sorry.” Lydia mutters, pulling her hand away but Stiles is faster than she is. 

He pulls her into him by her waist and slants his lips over hers. 

It’s like they’d never kissed, like everything they’d shared up till now had been a hazy dream, barely even a memory, because  _ this  _ is kissing. And he could  _ drown  _ in a kiss like this, with his hands sliding up her back and into her hair and the intensity of sensation--his new ears listening to her heart, her breathing, his new hands feeling each little difference in textures across her back--heightening absolutely everything. It’s hard to think, impossible to breathe, like this. 

Lydia freezes, going still as a statue and Stiles hesitates.  _ Does she not want him to kiss her? _

He pulls back and her face is awash with sadness. 

“What?” He breathes, his face a hair’s breadth from hers. 

“It’s simply--there’s something--this isn’t what you wanted.” Lydia finally murmurs, her breath ghosting across his face. He leans back a little further so he can at least try to focus, but he keeps his hands on either side of her face.  

He has to tread carefully here. 

“Maybe not,” He allows and her face falls for a fraction of a second until she schools her expression,  _ “But,  _ I also wasn’t sure I was gonna live at all. I’d rather be a vampire than dead at the hands of an absolute maniac.” 

“But you never asked, never once even hinted that this was what you wanted.” Lydia says, her brows furrowed and her eyes still filled with apprehension and sadness. 

“It wasn’t, at the time.” He explains, “I didn’t need to be a vampire to be with you. I was happy to be human. It would’ve been weird as time went on, but it was what I wanted. I didn’t want you to think that I thought I needed to change for you. I didn’t.” 

“And you don’t.” Lydia says forcefully, her hand coming up to his cheek, “You don’t need to change to be with me.” 

“I know.” Stiles says, and he grins, pure elation filling his chest, “And I knew it before being a vampire too. This isn’t something I asked for, but it isn’t something  _ you  _ asked for either. That’s what matters, to me.” 

“So, you’re not angry? Or disappointed?” Lydia asks, pulling her lip between her teeth. Stiles’ thumb tugs at it until she releases it. 

“No.” He breathes, his eyes still on her lips, “Definitely not disappointed. Not angry.” His head feels less foggy, like there’s more room for him to think even when he’s this close to her, this wrapped up in her, but she’s still utterly intoxicating. 

“Good.” Lydia whispers. Her eyes land on his lips and for a moment he thinks she’s gonna kiss him, but she takes a step back. His hands had still been on her but he lets them drop. 

“There’s a lot we have to do, for right now.” Lydia explains, “But there’ll be plenty of time for that.” She promises and Stiles feels light-headed. But not in the same way, not like he’s lost all the air in his lungs, but more like his brain clears of everything but her and the intensity of his emotions leaves him feeling off balance, even though he knows he’ll never actually  _ be  _ off balance again. 

Stiles pulls open the door and darts down the stairs, pulling Lydia with him effortlessly, like she hadn’t had time to pull away or even catch up. He must be faster than she is, this new. 

He sees Heather then, sitting on the couch with the most pissed off expression he’s ever seen on her. 

“Holy shit.” He says, for lack of anything better, even in his new and improved brain. 

Her head snaps up to his and she snarls. Heather lunges for him only to be held back by Jackson with his arms around her torso. 

“I will  _ kill you,  _ Stilinski.” She spits and it actually scares him. He takes a step back and puts his hands up in surrender. 

“What?  _ Why?” _ He asks and she laughs sharply, miserably. 

_“Why?_ Really? I’m a fucking _vampire,”_ Heather snaps, “Which I didn’t even know _existed_ a few days ago.” Stiles wonders absently what day it is. 

_ His dad.  _ He needs to know what’s going on there and looks to Isaac, who’s leaning against a wall and surveying both the scene in front of him and the future. 

“He’s fine.” Isaac answers the question Stiles hadn’t needed to ask, “You’ll need to go see him soon, though.” Stiles nods. 

“And because of  _ you  _ a fucking  _ psycho  _ kidnapped me and held me hostage!” Heather shouts, like Isaac hadn’t said anything. 

Stiles flinches violently.

“You think I had anything to do with that?” He shouts, suddenly blindingly furious and defensive even though he knows he has no right to be, “You think that if I had  _ anything  _ to do with it I would’ve let that happen?” 

“Oh, so you just didn’t know there was a homicidal maniac out for your blood?!” 

“I didn’t know he’d go after you!” Stiles shouts, “I didn’t know you’d be in danger! Heather, who the  _ fuck _ do you think I am?!” 

That seems to bring her up short and she briefly stops struggling in Jackson’s arms, but he doesn’t let her go. 

“What the fuck do you mean you didn’t know?” She snaps.

Stiles growls--an actual, animalistic growl, “I mean I didn’t know! I got him away from here so I could keep my friends and my dad safe, we led him away but I had  _ no idea  _ he’d come after you.” 

“He said you led him right to me. Explain that one to me,  _ if you please.”  _ She snarls. Stiles’ lip lifts over his teeth. 

“I didn’t know! I didn’t know he’d be able to find you, all I said was your name, I had no idea he wouldn’t need more than that.” All of the fight bleeds out of him at once. 

_ This is your fault.  _ He thinks mercilessly.

“I’m sorry.” He says, “Fuck--” his voice breaks “--fuck I’m  _ so  _ sorry, Heather.” 

She flinches back, and Jackson’s hands land on her hips to steady her.

“Get off me!” Heather snaps over her shoulder at Jackson who smirks and lifts his hands placatingly. “You’re distracting.” She grumbles.

Jackson chuckles but takes a step back. He doesn’t go very far. 

“I didn’t know, I’m sorry.” Stiles says again, his voice thick. It’s strange, crying as a vampire. It’s not that he can’t, but the actual tears don’t fall. He can feel the stinging in his eyes, can feel the lump in his throat, but tears don’t actually fall. 

He’s guessing that to actually cry, he’d really need to. 

“Sorry doesn’t cut it, Stiles.” Heather says, her voice tight and miserable and so, so sad. 

“I know it doesn’t.” He says. “You deserved a choice in this and you didn’t get one and I’m so sorry and I know that nothing I could  _ ever  _ say could make it up to you, or make it better, but god dammit, I’m never gonna stop trying.” 

“Who the fuck said I wanted you to spend eternity grovelling?” She spits and tears are gathering on her lashes. 

“Too bad!” He shouts, “It’s what you get!” 

“You’re an asshole!” 

“And you’re a bitch!” 

Stiles bites his lip. This is not  _ at all  _ the time to laugh but he can’t help thinking of that party in junior year that neither of them had wanted to be at and the stupid argument they’d had over the last shitty wine cooler. She’d told him he was an asshole for trying to take it from her and he’d said she was a bitch for keeping it to herself.

Heather’s lip quivers. 

Stiles can’t help it.

He laughs, the sound of it jarring in the room full of very tense vampires. 

Heather laughs too, a high, tinkling laugh that sounds like wind chimes. 

They laugh for far longer than the situation calls for, but Stiles can’t stop. He’s marvelling at the fact that he’s not out of breath, that his stomach muscles aren’t protesting the harsh treatment. He feels like he could laugh for hours. 

They finally wind down and then he’s across the room and she’s in his arms and she’s squeezing him tight enough that it should hurt. It doesn’t.

“I’m sorry.” He says into her hair and she burrows further into his neck. 

“I know you are.” She says, “I don’t want you to apologize forever, though.”

“I don’t know if I can stop.” He tells her honestly.

“I need time, Mischief.” She tells him, affectionately using his mom’s old nickname for him, “Probably lots of time, to deal with everything that happened.” She leans back to look him in the eye, “But I don’t want us to stop being friends.” 

Stiles bites his lip and nods. 

“Only if that’s what you want.” He cautions. 

Heather rolls her eyes. “Do you have to be so insufferably accommodating?” 

Stiles grins. “Yes.” 

“You know,” Heather starts and lifts a hand probably as she’d thought to do it judging by her marvelling facial expression, “Jesus, does that ever go away?” She asks as an aside. Stiles laughs. 

“I don’t know, I just woke up.” 

She mock-scowls at him. “You know, I was going to say that you’re quite a dish now,” She says, “But now I think I’m regretting it.” 

Stiles grins, “You’re not so bad yourself, Sinclaire.”

She flips her hair over her shoulder. 

“Obviously.” 

“Looks good from this angle too.” Jackson says behind her and Heather gasps, scandalized, turning wide eyes up to Stiles.   

“I didn’t mishear that, did I?” She whispers to Stiles, so low he wouldn’t have heard her if he were still human. Stiles snickers. 

“No, no you did not.” Stiles says at a normal volume, “And, as far as I’m concerned, this is an improvement.” He shrugs, Heather’s arms moving on top of his shoulders, “He’s generally kind of an ass.” 

“We’ve literally spent a cumulative six hours together, tops.” Jackson interjects and Stiles grins. 

“More than enough time.” Stiles quips. Then he sighs, “I have to go talk to my dad.” 

Heather makes a wry face. Stiles shrugs, but even he can feel how solemn a shrug it is. 

“Jackson and I will go with you,” Lydia says, then grimaces, “But you’ll have to eat before you go.” 

Stiles wants to argue, to say that he would never hurt his dad, but ultimately Lydia has way more expertise on this front than he does. 

He nods and she leads both him and Heather to the basement where there’s a hunting fridge full of blood bags. 

“Morbid.” He comments and Lydia rolls her eyes. 

“Yes, well, it could be a dead body.”

“I didn’t say this was bad, I said it was morbid.” He points out. 

What follows is one of the strangest experiences Stiles has ever had, or likely will ever have. Lydia hands him a blood bag--A Positive, his overactive brain supplies--and delivers another bag--B Negative--to Heather. 

Victoria takes over the tutorial when they go back upstairs.

She instructs them to open the bags--producing a pair of scissors from literally nowhere--and makes a waving hand motion for them to continue. 

Stiles and Heather share apprehensive glances until the moment the first blood bag is opened. 

Lydia had been right, when he’d asked what now seems like forever ago. It isn’t a lust for the blood itself, it’s life. It…buzzes. Blood has a smell, yes, but that isn’t the appetizing part. It feels like he’s holding life in his hands, the cure to any ill, the antidote to every issue, the clearance of every obstacle.

It’s like he loses awareness, for a while. All he can see or feel or smell is the blood and how it feels to have it. It’s a surge of energy, a rejuvenation. Like he’s  _ alive.  _

He can understand how vampires choose not to live with humans, to lead nomadic lives and feed as they please. Because this right here is the equivalent of every drug, every vice; the rush he feels is better than all of that, he’s absolutely sure of it. 

When he finally comes up for air--literally and figuratively--and looks over at Heather he can’t help but laugh, still feeling the rush and more than a little loopy. 

Her eyes refocus and look over at him and seeing what he looks like she falls into near hysterics right alongside him. 

She’s  _ covered  _ in blood; around her mouth, her teeth, her shirt, hell, even her  _ hair  _ has blood in it. 

“That’s gross.” Stiles gasps through peals of laughter. 

“You--you’re one to talk.” She giggles. 

He looks down at himself and sees his shirt--different than the one he was wearing last time he was aware--is similarly coated in red. It’s starting to get sticky. 

Lydia hands each of them another bag. 

“Perhaps try not to eat like children.” She suggests primly and Stiles snarls playfully at her. 

This one goes over better, now that he’s more used to the feeling, and he manages to actually eat--drink?--most of it. Heather seems to be fairing even better than him.

He comments on it and she admits, “I already had one.” 

“Oh, then I rescind all compliments.” Stiles states. 

“What? Why?” 

“Because you were just as big a mess as me: the newbie.” 

“I’m still a newbie, I only woke up like four hours ago.” She says defensively. 

“Five.” Isaac corrects from the other side of the room and Heather scowls at him. 

“The point is,” Stiles continues smoothly, “That we’re on equal footing.” 

“For now.” She says forebodingly and he laughs. 

He feels giddy, light and happy in a way he had been reasonably sure he would never feel again and it’s exhilarating. 

“Okay, we need to shower.” Stiles says, “We can’t see my dad like this.” 

“I can’t see your dad.” Heather says, horrified, “Stiles, what if I hurt him?” 

“We’re not going alone, dipshit,” Stiles says, “Your boyfriend’s coming, remember?.” He grins at her and effortlessly dodges the smack that immediately follows his comment.  _ Oh, I could get used to that.  _

“He’s not my--oh my God, I just realised why you didn’t encourage me.” 

“Beyond the fact that you generally need to be stopped?” Stiles asks solemnly. 

She glares at him. “Because  _ apparently  _ my taste in guys is ‘unattainable’ and then I went and got a crush one  _ the most  _ unattainable guy in history.” She says, seemingly oblivious to their audience of vampires who’re doing a horrible job of concealing their laughter. 

Stiles snorts, “That’s not even a crush, you just think he’s hot.” 

“That is, by  _ definition, _ a crush.” Heather insists and Stiles grins before pulling her to his chest again, squeezing her too tight. “Okay, what’s this for?” 

“I’m just glad I didn’t lose you.” Stiles says around the lump steadily forming in his throat. 

“Oh my god I can’t handle this right now.” She says, but burrows her head in the crook of his neck. 

“Okay, you’re sticking to me, this is so gross.” Stiles says and he can see Jackson shoot someone behind Stiles a surprised look. 

“Alright fine, shower it is.” Heather says and her eyes gain a mischievous glint. “Last one out’s a rotten egg?” 

“Oh my god, you are five years old.” 

She just grins and then she’s gone, up the stairs, and he can already hear the shower running. 

\---

Standing in front of his house is surreal. 

The last time he’d been here, he was running for his life, trying to do the impossible and convince his dad to let him leave. 

Now he’s standing in front of it, alive, but a vampire and forever eighteen years old. 

“Fuck.” He summarizes and Heather comes up next to him. 

“Yeah.” She lets out an anxious breath and grabs his hand. 

He walks--trying very, very hard to go slow but still going way faster than a human would--up the steps and trying the door, surprised to find it’s been left unlocked this late at night. It’s now approximately eleven.  

“Hello?” Stiles’ dad calls and Stiles just  _ goes.  _

He runs, the speed far too fast for what he should be going but he doesn’t  _ care.  _ It’s his dad and he’s alive and Stiles is alive and it’s all too much. 

He pulls his dad into his arms and only barely has the presence of mind to be gentle. 

“Stiles?” His dad croaks and Stiles nods, words failing him even with his new, spacious brain. 

Stiles hears Heather, Jackson, and Lydia walk in behind him. 

“Holy shit, Heather, is that you?” Stiles’ dad says, shocked. Stiles pulls back and then his dad’s eyes are on him. “Now I know you didn’t look like that when you left.” 

Stiles isn’t entirely sure what his dad is referring to, but based on the reflection he’d caught of himself after his shower, it’s a lot to process. 

Stiles hadn’t been unattractive before becoming a vampire but now he’s staggeringly handsome, on par with Isaac and Jackson, easily, if in his own way. He doesn’t have Isaac’s messiness and sarcastic charm or Jackson’s angularity and general swagger. But he’s more confident now, more sure of who he is. His features had sharpened, lost all traces of youth and naivete, everything about his face had rearranged to look just slightly  _ more.  _

And his eyes. They’re the same colour in name only. Before, he’d had light brown eyes, whiskey-caramel-coffee coloured, but now they’re so much more than that. They have hints of green, a little bit of blue; they’re warmer now, almost molten, they shift and change the longer you look at them and Stiles had spent quite a while looking at them. 

“Yeah, it’s a lot to take in.” Stiles says, reaching up to rub at the back of his neck, the habit still so ingrained, but now it only takes a fraction of a second to complete.

Noah looks between each of the teenagers in his kitchen, his eyes wide, and shaking his head minutely. 

“What’s going on?” He asks and Stiles grimaces. 

“It’s, uhm, kind of a long story.” 

“Are you okay?” His dad immediately asks, his brows furrowed. 

Stiles steps back from his dad and watches him take in every detail. 

“Stiles, you’re scaring me.” His dad says, “Are you in danger?” 

Stiles shakes his head. “The tracker is dead.” He offers simply. His dad nods but doesn’t say anything, his face still the picture of concern. 

“And you and Heather are alright?” He persists. He looks past Stiles to Heather and holds out a hand to her. Heather steps hesitantly forward. 

“Hey, pops.” She says softly and Stiles’ dad’s eyes widen, flitting all over Heather’s face and back to Stiles periodically. 

“You alright?” He repeats, more insistently this time, and Stiles nods, Heather quick to follow. 

His dad takes a breath. “Okay. Good. God, I was so worried about you two.” He pulls them both in for a hug. Stiles feels Heather stiffen next to him, waiting for the urge to hurt the man she came to consider her dad, in every way other than genetics. But she relaxes, probably feeling exactly like Stiles does; completely in control. Their desire to keep Noah safe completely outweighs anything else. 

“I think we might have some explaining to do.” Stiles offers and his dad snorts. 

“Maybe more than a little.” He says, but it’s light. 

They head to the kitchen table and sit, Lydia and Jackson sitting together and as apart from the rest of them as they can reasonably be without leaving. 

“So, I take it everything worked out…okay?” His dad asks, delicately bringing up the fact that he knowingly allowed murder, and also somehow deftly side-stepping it.

Stiles nods, “Yes. You’re not in any danger anymore.” His dad shakes his head. 

“I wasn’t worried about me.” He brushes Stiles off. “What happened to you two?” 

“He…he turned us.” Stiles says haltingly, “He meant to turn Heather, but I think I was an accident.” 

“An accident?” His father asks, eyes narrowing. “Wait,  _ turned you?” _

Stiles bites his lip. “So, I’m sort of a vampire, now.” He offers awkwardly. His dad’s eyes widen a fraction as he looks between Stiles and Heather. 

“Both of you?” They nod. “And how are you feeling about that?” 

Stiles is momentarily too shocked to say anything. He’d been afraid that his dad would be scared, afraid to be in the same room with him, afraid for his own life, but it’s nothing like that. He keeps surveying the two of them, like he’s checking for injuries. 

“Lots of things, I guess.” Stiles says, then looks over at Heather, finding he’s just as curious to hear her answer as his dad. 

Heather tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, her hair still wet from the shower. “Honestly? Not so great. But it’s better than being dead. That part  _ really _ sucked.” 

“You  _ died?”  _ His dad nearly squeaks. 

“Yeah. It wasn’t fun.” Stiles says glancing to the side. Heather grabs Stiles’ hand in hers and grips it tight. 

“So then…how does someone become…” His dad falters, trailing off before he can say the word, his gaze sliding over Stiles and Heather. 

“We have something akin to venom.” Lydia steps in, her tone clinical and instructional, “It transfers the material needed to change the next person, but the person needs to die with it still within their bloodstream. They don’t stay dead for very long, a day or two, maybe less, depending upon the person. Heather was only dead for fourteen hours, Stiles for seventeen.” 

His dad sits back in his seat and Stiles hunches his shoulders. He has no idea how to proceed. 

“So you’re--you’re--” His dad flounders, then huffs a surprised laugh, “This is a lot to process.” He sobers, “How is this affecting you? Do you--do you have to kill people?” His eyes are filled with unease. 

“No, no I don’t have to do that at all.” Stiles rushes to explain, to reassure, “There are other ways, the Argents don’t kill people, they use blood bags.” 

“And there’s no cure?” 

Stiles feels it like a punch in the chest, like he’s physically knocked back and his breath leaves him all at once. 

“No.” Lydia says for Stiles, her voice soft, “There’s no cure.” 

“Does that bother you?” He asks the two of them and Stiles inhales sharply. 

_ Does it? _

“Not really.” Stiles says, surprising himself, “Not entirely, anyways. I really didn’t want to die.” 

His dad looks expectantly at Heather and she grimaces. 

“Yeah. It does.” She tells him, “I didn’t wanna die there, not like that. But I didn’t really want this either. I didn’t get a say.” She doesn’t look at anyone, but her other hand curls into a fist. 

“Do you want to tell me what happened?” Stiles’ dad asks in a smooth, even tone. It’s welcoming, calming. 

“Not…not yet.” Heather admits, “It’s too fresh. It’s too much.” 

Stiles’ dad nods and looks to Stiles. 

“I think he was gonna kill me when they got there.” Stiles says, gesturing to Jackson and Lydia, wanting to get this over with but still needing to give his dad the information. He doesn’t really want to relive it either, in all honesty. “He got interrupted.” 

“So you didn’t die because he killed you?” His dad asks, frowning. 

“Not…really.” 

“He had broken ribs,” Lydia offers, “And one of them punctured a lung. He…” She clears her throat, “He died only seconds after we got there.” 

“Jesus.” His dad whispers. Stiles looks up at Lydia. He hadn’t even thought to ask how he’d died. “Lydia, I’m so sorry.” 

Lydia looks up, surprised. 

“I’m sorry you had to live through that.” His dad’s eyes are so sad it hurts in Stiles’ chest somewhere less-than-physical. 

Lydia nods. “Thank you.” She whispers. She smooths her skirt and keeps her eyes downcast. 

“I’m really, really glad you guys are okay.” His dad says, his tone so genuine Stiles is taken aback.

“This doesn’t…this doesn’t bother you?” Stiles finally asks the question he’d been dreading the answer to. 

“Is it gonna take some getting used to? Yeah, of course. But am I mad at you? Absolutely not. You had no say in this, and it would be horrible of me to blame you for being victims of a fucked up situation.” His dad says and Stiles lets all the air in his lungs out in a rush. “You’re my son, Stiles.” He reaches out and wraps his fingers around Stiles’ hand. He must notice how much warmer Stiles’ skin is than it should be, but he doesn’t say anything. 

“And you, missy,” His dad says to Heather, who looks up, “You’re my kid too. And I’m thanking God I’ve got you back” 

Tears gather on her lashes and and sniffs, pulling her lips between her teeth. She nods, unable to say anything in response to that. His dad reaches out with his other hand and Heather places her hand in his. He holds it just as tightly as he’s holding Stiles’

“Your eyes…” His dad says, trailing off, glancing back over at Stiles. 

“I know, they’re kind of--”

“They still look just like your mother’s.” His dad interrupts softly and Stiles startles. 

It was a fear he hadn’t even known he had. After all of the changes he’d gone through and all the differences between his human self and now, he’d thought maybe he’d lost something of himself that he’d never get back. 

Like his mother’s eyes. 

He looks up and sees that the table has been vacated of Lydia and Jackson, who had gone outside to offer them the illusion of privacy, but Stiles can still hear their voices as though they were only a few feet away. He knows they can hear the three of them just fine, but the gesture is appreciated. 

“Would she hate me?” Stiles whispers and his dad’s hand squeezes his, almost reflexively. 

He comes to the realisation, here and now, that he’s not going to die. 

If there is an afterlife, where people meet their long dead loved ones and live together happily after death, he’ll likely never see it. 

Tears well and then fall over his cheeks, cold against his heated skin.

He’s never going to see his mom again.

Maybe he’d been holding onto some kind of hope for Heaven, or something equivalent. Onto the idea that he’d die and then be with her again. But now that’s not possible. 

He’s  _ never _ going to die. __

Stiles’ hand leaves Heather’s and comes up to his mouth as he tries to grapple with the shock of it all. 

It’s like he’s back in that stupid hospital room, watching all of the monitors announcing his mom’s death, like he’s living that exact same pain. It wraps a fist around his heart and  _ squeezes,  _ agonizing sorrow and so much loss it’s hard to breathe flowing through him. 

He lets out a sob, wrenching his hand away from his dad’s, knowing that if he hangs on, he could break his fingers. 

“Stiles?” His dad ventures, his voice worried and tense. 

Stiles sobs again. “I’m--” It’s so hard to breathe, “I’m never gonna--gonna see her again.” 

He can hear his father’s sharp intake of breath, hear his heartbeat speed up. His father’s heartbeat is so unlike the heart beats of the vampires he’s spent the last few hours with. It’s steady, and deep--warm, even. The Argents’ heartbeats are all so light, so fast, hardly making any sound at all. 

Heather’s hand smooths over his back. 

“Oh, kid.” His dad sighs and Stiles presses the heels of his palms into his eyes, willing the tears to stop, just for a little while. His new emotions are so intense, it’s so much harder to get a handle on them. 

His dad’s hand lands on his shoulder, cold even through the layers of his clothes. It’s comforting. 

He stays like that for a long time. He has no idea how long, his perception of time so warped it’s impossible to tell. His dad’s hand stays where it is, no matter how much time has passed, Heather’s slowly rubbing soothing circles across his back.

When he finally gets a handle on it all, he doesn’t feel any better. That’s the worst part of tears of grief; they don’t make it better. They just hurt. 

“She wouldn’t hate you, Stiles.” His dad finally says, his voice soft, but insistent, “She was your mother and she loved you just as much as I do, no matter what shape you take.” 

Stiles doesn’t know if he believes him. But he also can’t live with the crushing weight of a question only one person can answer. And his dad is the closest he’s gonna get. 

“You’re not…scared?” Stiles finally asks. 

“Of you? Not in a million years, Stiles. You’re my son. I know you would never hurt me.” His dad says immediately, his tone leaving no room for argument, “Scared  _ for  _ you? Of course. Doesn’t matter what you are, I’m never gonna stop worrying about you.” 

Stiles’ chest clenches and he offers a watery smile. 

“Well, if it makes you feel any better, I’m basically indestructible now.” Stiles tries, offering half a smile that may look more like a grimace. 

“No, that does not make me feel better, because knowing you, you’ll take that to mean you can go do whatever you want without consequences.” His dad says and Heather stifles a giggle poorly, “I’m still your father young man and I will prove it if I’m forced to.” 

Stiles scoffs, “I can literally lift a car.” 

Something that looks suspiciously like interest flits across his dad’s face before he can school it away and Stiles laughs. 

“I’ll show you sometime.” He promises. 

“Not to worry, Sheriff,” Lydia says from the doorway, “We’ll keep him out of trouble. _We_ _can_ keep up with him.” 

Stiles snorts. “No you can’t. I’m faster than you right now.” 

“Whatever do you mean?” She asks innocently. 

“I mean I was dragging you all over the house today and you couldn’t do a thing to stop it.” 

“'Couldn’t' is a strong word.” Lydia says primly. 

Stiles rolls his eyes. 

“So, what does this mean long term?” Stiles’ dad asks as Jackson and Lydia file back in, taking their previous seats at the table. 

“He won’t be able to go back to school quite yet.” Lydia starts, taking her seat and crossing her legs, “It’ll be too much to handle all at once and we’ll have to ease him into it. He’s not used to all of that sensory input.” 

“Okay.” Noah nods, filing this away, “And do you intend to go back to school?” He eyes Stiles. 

Stiles grins. 

“Dad, I can literally go to college forever. I can learn  _ everything.” _

His dad laughs. “Of course. I forgot who I was talking to.” 

“Clearly.” Stiles says and allows the swat to the back of his head. He moves his head with it so it doesn’t feel like his dad smacks into solid stone

“We’ll have to move around a lot.” Lydia adds gently, “We can only stay so long in one place before people start to notice that we don’t age. It takes longer than you might think, approximately seven years, sometimes longer depending on the place and the level of scrutiny.” 

Stiles’ dad’s face falls before he schools his expression. 

“That makes sense.” He says reasonably. 

“But that doesn’t in any way mean that Stiles can’t come back, or that you aren’t welcome to come with us.” Lydia hastens to add, “That much is entirely up to you two. Financially, my family is quite set up, Isaac makes sure of that.” 

Stiles’ dad darts a look over at Stiles. 

“Isaac can see the future.” Stiles explains. His dad struggles with this for a moment before he waves a hand. 

“I’m going to file that under ‘shit I can’t explain but can’t argue with’.” 

Stiles and Heather laugh. 

“A smart move, sheriff.” Lydia compliments. 

“Now I already told you, Lydia, it’s Noah.” His dad insists and Stiles snickers. 

“Apologies, Noah.” She smiles dazzlingly at him. 

“How long are you planning to stay here?” Noah asks. 

“That depends upon you, actually.” Lydia explains, “If you’ve grown attached to this place and wish to stay, then we can stay. You’ll have to make excuses for Stiles’ absence, and his inability to continue his senior year.

“Obviously, he looks quite different now,” She continues, offering Stiles an indulgent smile, “So he’ll have to get better at deflecting questions he can’t answer.” She winks at him and he knows if he could still blush, he would. 

“We can forge any credentials he needs to get into college.” Lydia says and Stiles squawks   indignantly, “Stiles, you can’t finish your senior year here, you can do it over later if you’re so inclined.” 

He wrinkles his nose, “Oh my God, why would I stay in high school when I could go to college? I’m just pissed off I won’t get in based on my own credentials. And besides that, with the whole age thing, you know that one guy that still looks like he’s twelve? Thomas something?”

“Thomas Brodie-Sangster?” Jackson provides, speaking for the first time. 

“Yeah, that guy! He’s like twenty-seven and he still looks, like, fifteen. I could just go to college and if anyone thinks I look a little young to be there they’ll just say I have a baby face.” Stiles insists and Heather snorts. 

“Nothing about your face reads ‘baby’ anymore.” She tells him point blank and he scowls at her. 

“My point still stands.” 

Lydia rolls her eyes, “Fine, you don’t have to go to high school, I won’t make  you. But we will have to forge things for you in the long run, social security, IDs, passports, birth certificates. We’ve had to do it for every new place we go, and we’ll have to do it for you too.” 

Stiles considers something. 

“Do I have to change my name?” He asks. Lydia ponders for a moment. 

“Periodically,” She hedges, “Again, that depends on Noah and what he plans to do. If he’s planning to follow us when we go, then you can keep the same name as him, but it will probably have to change at some point. But that’s substantially further down the line and not something you need to worry about right at this moment.” 

“So, essentially,” Stiles’ dad starts, “Everything will change?” 

“In summation.” Lydia smiles. 

He nods. “I expected as much. But I appreciate you laying it all out for me.” 

“Of course, Noah.” She says. 

“And you still live in my house?” His dad asks Stiles, his face unreadable. 

Stiles finds he doesn’t actually know the answer to that one. He looks to Lydia. 

“At first, it may be easier for him to continue to get acclimated to his new senses and needs with us,” She says, “But following that--perhaps in a few weeks depending on how well he does--he’ll be back under your roof.” 

“I think I can live with that.” His dad says and affectionately ruffles his hair.

“Well, this has been stressful,” Heather says brightly, “And I, for one, want to go beat a tree into sawdust.” 

“I can help you with that.” Jackson says, standing from his seat and offering his hand to Heather to help her up, like the male protagonist in a period drama and Stiles mock gags behind her. Jackson smirks at him. 

Heather somehow manages to look flustered without having the physical ability to blush. 

They fly out of the house and leave Stiles, Lydia, and his dad at the kitchen table. 

“I sincerely wish I didn’t have to take Stiles away from you,” Lydia says seriously, “But you should get some rest. I’m sure the last few days have been truly horrific for you.” 

Stiles’ dad snorts, “Well, I won’t deny that.” He places a hand on Stiles’ shoulder and squeezes. “And it would be nice to get some real sleep. You better be back tomorrow to see me, young man, you’re not moving out yet.” He says sternly and Stiles grins. 

“Cross my heart.” 

He and Lydia head up to his room to grab a few things he’ll need while staying with the Argents. 

As they’re leaving Stiles’ dad pulls him in for a hug that’s so tight it should’ve knocked the wind out of him, but Stiles has to hug back gingerly, barely even touching his dad’s back. 

“Sorry, I don’t really know my own strength yet and I don’t want to hurt you.” Stiles explains somewhat guiltily. 

His dad shakes his head against Stiles’ shoulder, effectively brushing aside Stiles’ guilt and his subsequent explanation for things he can’t control. “I’m just glad you’re safe.” 

Stiles lets out a breath and tightens his hold slightly. He’s not sure what he had been expecting from his dad, but he had been an absolute idiot for thinking it was gonna be anything other than concern for his well-being and unconditional love. This is  _ his dad  _ they’re talking about, what else would he have gotten?

\---

“We have an extra room, if you would feel more comfortable there.” Lydia offers tensely from the doorway of her bedroom. 

Stiles turns to look at her as he walks into her room, dropping his duffle bag as he goes. He smirks at her. 

“I’m good.” He tells her. 

He sees her cautiously smile and he grins. 

“Come here.” He requests and she goes, walking at a human pace and coming to stand in front of him. One of his hands flashes to her face, tilting her face up to look at him. The other lands comfortably on her waist

“I’d like to stay with you.” He tells her honestly. He can’t even imagine staying anywhere else. 

He’s still remarkably energized from the blood he had earlier in the night and he’s sure he’ll want to find out what sleep feels like now but he has something else he wants to try before then. 

Moving too fast for her to offer an over-accommodating dispute, he dips down and fastens his lips to her neck. He feels her sharp intake of breath as her hands come up to fist in the back of his shirt and he pulls her closer, both of his hands now flattened against her back, his fingers digging into her skin.

Stiles starts a path up her neck, leaving open-mouthed kisses all along the column of her throat. She gasps as he sucks on the skin below her ear and he groans at the taste of her skin and the feel of her pulling him impossibly closer. 

“Stiles.” She gasps and he gives a low laugh. The confidence he feels, the heady sensation of having her exactly where he wants her is  _ intoxicating.  _ His hands are big enough to envelope her waist completely, and they had been before, but now the perception has changed. He knows that he could bodily move her if he wanted to, and he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t thinking about all of the uses of that particular ability. His mind supplies a grainy, low focus, human memory of pressing her against her bedroom wall. 

“Yes?” He mumbles against her jaw before dragging his tongue back down to her neck and then biting down on the junction between her shoulder and her neck. She moans.

“Jesus.” She whispers, “Stiles,” She tries again, going for more insistent, but her voice is noticeably breathless. And he can hear her heartbeat, can hear how it’s sped up, and her breathing and how shallow it’s become. He grins against her shoulder and finally pauses his assault. 

He lifts only slightly, keeping his lips a hair’s breadth away from hers, teasing her with the potential. 

“I…” She starts, blinking dazedly up at him. He grins. “I…wanted…”

“Whatever you want, Lydia, you can have it.” Stiles murmurs and his breath catches when he feels her shudder. 

“I wanted to talk to you.” She says all in a rush, her breath still unsteady and the beat of her heart still quicker than normal. 

“Should I be nervous?” He asks playfully and she tenses. He backs up, frowning, “Should I?” He repeats. 

Her eyes don’t meet his. 

“That depends, I suppose.” Lydia says. She disentagles herself and he lets her go reluctantly. She sits on the couch and he follows her, sitting fast enough it pushes the couch back a few inches. He grimaces, but she offers him a small, there-and-gone smile. 

She doesn’t speak for a while and again Stiles has no idea how much time passes, but it feels like hours. 

“I wanted to make it perfectly clear,” She finally starts, “That I don’t have expectations for you.” She tucks a piece of firey hair behind her ear and he’s momentarily distracted by it, but he refocuses quickly. 

“What do you mean?” Stiles asks, his nerves mounting. 

She exhales, then spins to face him, one of her legs folded up on the couch, “This isn’t what you wanted.” She says for the second time that day and he tenses, still as a statue, “And I know that there may be a lot of--of pressure on you to be or do things you may not have wanted before that now have become a necessity or an expectation of sorts. I simply wanted to assure you that--that I--”

“Lydia,” He interrupts, “What are you trying to tell me?” 

She looks up at him, her eyes conflicted. 

“I’m not expecting things from you.” She says, her eyes searching his, “I’m not expecting you to stay.” 

Stiles blinks.  _ What?  _

“Why wouldn’t I stay?” He asks, stunned.

She grimaces. “Eternity is a long time, Stiles, we can’t _ \--I  _ can’t expect you to want to stay with us when you don’t have to.” She bites her lip. “You have a whole future ahead of you, so many years and the whole world for your perusal.” She takes a deep breath. 

“I won’t ask you to be satisfied with this life.” Lydia finally finishes and refuses to look up at him, staring down at her laced fingers. 

Stiles is quiet for a moment. 

“Lydia,” He murmurs and she flinches. He sighs, “Lydia how could you  _ ever  _ think I wouldn’t want you?” He asks softly, because at the root of her speech, that had been her fear. Sure, she wouldn’t want him to feel trapped geographically, but he’s sure she’s worried that him becoming a vampire would make him feel like he has to stay with her, even if he doesn’t want to. 

She startles, finally looking up at him. “It’s not that I think you don’t want me,” She says, “It’s that I don’t want you to feel you have some form of  _ obligation  _ towards me and my family when there isn’t any.” 

He takes a breath. 

“I would like to travel the world,” Stiles says and she nods impassively, her face skillfully blank, “And I want to learn new things, and become someone I haven’t met yet. I want to go places and meet people, and I know how much easier it is to do those things now.

“But I would never even  _ dream  _ of doing any of it without you.” He finishes. Lydia looks up at him through her lashes, her bottom lip held tightly between her teeth. 

“What I said a few days ago hasn’t changed. I want you.” Stiles tells her, “As long as you still want me, I would be absolutely delighted to have you, and be had by you.” 

She smiles shyly. 

“I do still want you.” Lydia admits and he grins, “But if you ever change your mind, if you ever need space or, or want to go off on your own, you have every right to do so.” 

Stiles nods. “I know I do.” And oddly enough, he does, “And I’m glad that you told me all of this. That you lifted the pressure off,” He grabs her hand, smoothing his thumb over the backs of her knuckles, “But you didn’t need to.” 

Lydia smiles at him, dimples out in full force and he’s surprised--and yet not at all--to find that it still dazzles him completely. 

“I love you.” She says and he smiles, so wide it hurts his cheeks. 

“I love you.” He leans forward, stopping just short of kissing her, “Can I kiss you now?” He says, so low she wouldn’t have heard it if she weren’t a vampire. 

If she weren’t exactly the same as him. 

“Yes.” She breathes and he doesn’t need to be told twice. 

He leans the rest of the way, capturing her in a kiss. 

It starts slow--soft and sweet and loving--but it doesn’t take long for it to shift, to gain urgency. Stiles pulls her onto his lap with ease, leaning back against the arm of the couch. His hands roam any part of her he can reach, never settling for too long in one place. Her skin is smooth under his hands as he trails them up her thighs. One of his hands continues further, comes to rest at the small of her back and he tugs her tight against him. 

“Fuck.” She exhales against his lips and he chuckles as he moves his hand from her thigh up to her waist, his fingers pressing against her ribs. 

She grinds down against his hips and he exhales in a rush, his fingers flexing against her. 

Suddenly he’s not on the couch anymore but he can actually telegraph the movements as she pulls him to the bed, flipping him so he lands on his back and throwing one leg over him to settle against his hips. 

But Stiles doesn’t let them stay like that for long, spinning them so he can hover over her, his lips pressing kisses along her jaw and down her neck. He feels the scar she has there underneath his lips and presses a few more against it. She gasps. 

“You’re surprisingly determined.” Lydia says, out of breath. He grins, some part of his brain saying  _ we did that.  _

“Neck kisses were off-limits before.” He offers by way of explanation, his lips moving against her shoulder and then her collar bone as he kisses across her chest, “And besides that, what’s so surprising about my determination?” He drags his tongue across her other collar bone and she moans. 

“You’re right,” She mumbles, “I shouldn’t be surprised by determination from you.” 

“I’m here now, aren’t I?” He points out. Lydia pulls at the hem of his shirt, yanking it up and over his head. Her hands drag over every exposed inch of skin and Stiles shivers. 

He kisses down her chest, stopping just before the top of her dress and moving back up to her jaw and then finally her lips, biting at her bottom lip and savoring the soft sound she makes. 

Her hips lift against his and he has to pull away, resting his forehead on her shoulder, breathing heavily. 

“Too much?” She whispers and he shakes his head. 

“Well, kind of,” He admits, “But it’s more that if we start I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop.” 

He can hear her lick her lips. 

“Do you want to stop?” Lydia asks carefully and he groans. 

“No.” He sighs. “Do you think we should?” 

“Are you ready?” She asks instead of answering. 

He thinks about it then pulls away to sit back on his heels. He needs space to think and being this close to her makes that infinitely harder. But from up here he can see her hair fanned out against her pillows and the heaving of her chest. Her legs frame his and her dress had risen dangerously high on her thighs. Her lips are swollen and so enticing he has to shut his eyes. 

“I don’t know.” Stiles tells her honestly, “I want to, I want to so bad, but I also don’t want to hurt you.” He cracks one eye open, “I’m stronger than you right now, and I don’t want something like this to move in that direction. I never want to hurt you.” His fingers caress her cheek as he leans forward. “What do you want?” 

Lydia’s eyes search his face. 

“I want you.” She says, “And I don’t think you’ll hurt me.” She sits up, placing her hands on his chest, “But we don’t have to move forward if you don’t want to.” She places a finger against his lips when he opens his mouth to protest. He nips it. “If you’re not truly ready to do so.” She modifies. 

He nods then ducks in for another kiss.

“Okay.” He says.

“Okay.” She smiles. 

And so instead they just talk, laying side by side on her bed, laughing intermittently and discussing any number of topics ranging from microbiology to the book on her nightstand. He never relocates his shirt, but he doesn’t mind. 

For now, even with everything still slightly up in the air and confusing, he’s happy to be laying in the warmth of her room, her fingers laced with his. He’s happy to be watching the sunrise spreading lavenders and pinks and oranges across a cloudy sky with brand new eyes--the perfect start to a completely new beginning. 

The start of something so beautiful it leaves him astounded at his luck. Something as beautiful as this shouldn’t exist; something so perfect and breathtaking and wondrous can’t possibly be allowed to reach reality. Can’t possibly be allowed in the stark, honest light of day. 

And yet the sun rises. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *excuse my language* oh holy fucking shit it's done. jesus fucking christ its finished. you guys don't understand, this it the longest thing i've finished to date, as well as the first thing i've posted. this is fuckin HUGE for me. so on the topic of this shit finally being finished, thank you so much for reading, for commenting, for leaving kudos, all of it. i literally never would've finished this without knowing that people were reading it and enjoying it. you guys rock. 
> 
> ok i'll shut up now, just, thank you guys so much for reading. it truly, truly, means so much to me. leave some thoughts down below if you're so inclined! i love talking to you guys
> 
> edited to say: would you guys want a smutty one shot to go with this?? I've been playing with the idea cuz I knew I couldnt put it in the main story (the tone just didnt leave room for smu) so if theres interest in it I'm happy to write it. drop me a comment, lemme know


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